Fourth Wall, Book 1: The Wages of Fans is Fiction
by Crazyeight
Summary: A fan fiction writer is fed up with how his favorite TV show keeps disappointing his expectations. He aims to change that...with a story. Can the characters survive? Part I of the Fourth Wall series.
1. Chapter 1

The Wages of Fans is Fiction

By: Crazyeight

Disclaimer: I don't own Digimon. Period.

_It wasn't supposed to be this way…_

A sullen eyed boy looked at his computer screen, his eyes dry and red from staying up far too late, his mind swirling in confusion from having drank too many sugary liquids of the kind called soda. His room was covered wall to wall with pictures that he had drawn, various people and creatures, with one word dominating them all: Digimon.

Yes, he was a fan of Digimon. He loved it with a passion; the characters were so well written, perhaps more human than some people that he had known in his life, and his friends all shared this obsession. Not a day passed where they didn't talk about it at least once, and they discussed all the things that they had enjoyed about it, and all the things that they disliked about it. Sometimes those discussions could turn ugly. They all had their own personal preferences of course about how things should have gone when each season ended, but it never stopped them from being friends in the past.

Until now that is. A disagreement had gone just a little to far for him and he drew a line in the sand, and dared his friend to cross it.

She did.

He stared at his computer screen, his mind boiling with rage. He clicked on the Microsoft word program and activated it. Out of his friends, his peers, he was considered the most knowledgeable when it came to the details of the show. It didn't seem fair that one person's opinion should trump that, or that the reality that the show had already set in stone should matter. With each season's end he was disappointed anew, and he refused to give up what he held to be sacred. In his world, things were as he desired them to be. And he had plenty of evidence to prove it too! Why couldn't the creators see that? What was more, why couldn't his 'friend' see that?

_"It's over,"_ she had told him. _"That's the way things are, just deal with it. You can't change what the episodes showed us."_

It couldn't be. He wouldn't allow it. He'd find a way, by doing what he did best. By writing a story.

Yes. He'd show them. He'd show them all…

The boy set his fingers down on the keyboard and began typing.

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At that very moment, in another world, a boy named Izzy looked out his window and saw dark clouds forming in the sky, swirling like angry tentacles, lightning sparking within their embrace.

_This can't be good,_ he thought.


	2. Chapter 2

Belief and fact. We walk that line everyday, so often that the line has become blurred to the point where you can't tell the difference between the two. I call that blur desire, because that's what it seems to be about. Desire of what though? The desire to spin our own tale? To fix something that we disliked? To clear the air about some inconsistency from our favorite TV shows? I don't know for sure. I'm am not those other authors, so I can't lay claim to their thoughts, except that is my own and the one featured in this story. We're in a universe all of our own making, sort of. But we do create universes here, some beautiful, some not quite so beautiful. Really depends on your tastes and the authors writing style, but however you look at it, and you can argue about this if you want, we are all of us little gods when we tell our tales.

Except that we can't lay claim to that title. Heck, we can't even lay claim to the characters featured in our stories unless we make them up. We have to put a big, fat, disclaimer on our profiles and stories so that the true owners don't sue us and make our lives miserable.

But I digress. Earlier I had stated that we are all in universes of our making. Now imagine, just what would happen if one author, was able to make his universe the dominant one? All the others simply vanishing without a trace, as though they never existed, to the point where even the original storyline that birthed all the others was gone. How would the characters react? Would they even remember? Would they even care?

Let's take that journey, shall we? Let's see just what happens when there's a sudden shift in the universes paradigm.

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Izzy couldn't believe what he was seeing. At this moment, there was quite a bit going on. First off, there was a massive electrical storm raging outside, of a type that he hadn't seen before (that and the fact that it was a rather sudden occurrence. And the weatherman had called for clear skies today), and second, something was wrong with the fan fiction sight that he was looking at. Just a second ago he had received a message from some author (he couldn't remember the name) asking him if he wanted to partake in yet another romance story. Not that he minded really. From what he had read of the basic plot it actually sounded interesting, and he had nothing to do in the meantime. It would also have allowed him to see the other digidestined as well, if they were all going to be involved of course. They weren't always, but it didn't matter at the moment, because before he could even send a reply his computer screen warped.

_The network administrators are not going to be happy about this…_was all he had time to think before the universe suddenly seemed to lurch and black out.

Izzy blinked at the e-mail. It was from…Tai. Something about having an engagement with…Sora?

_I thought that she was going out with Matt right now?_ Izzy shook his head. What was he thinking? Matt wasn't going out with Sora. He never had. Tai and Sora had been going steady for the past three years. He typed in a reply, congratulating his friend on finally getting the nerve to pop the question and asked him if he had a day picked out, and if so, was he invited? As he waited for a reply, he looked out the window and smiled at the sun that shone so brightly. The sky was clear, and nothing else seemed to be so perfect before.

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Down in a park, a red haired boy with a blue dog-like digimon with boxing gloves looked up at the sky in utter confusion. He could have sworn that just a second ago that he saw…_Well, now you see it, now you don't. _The boy, whose name was William couldn't shake the feeling that something was wrong in the universe. But what? Looking down at his companion, he asked:

"Gaomon? What the heck just happened here?"

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	3. Chapter 3

Disclaimer: I don't own anything featured in this story that I haven't made up. At present.

The Wages of Fans is Fiction: Chapter 3

The doors leading to the Digimon branch of the Fan Fiction domain burst open and out walked two boys and two digimon. One of them had dark brown hair, a tanned complexion, and a red t-shirt with a green jacket over it. The digimon that walked next to him was orange with strands of zebra like hair coming out of his head, and he was striped like a tiger. The other had blonde hair, and was lighter than his companion, and wore a blue and black colored hoody, and perched on his shoulder was a greenish-gray colored reptile that looked like a cross between a Komodo dragon and a Chamelion. They are, in order of discription, Ryan, Richoemon, Chris, and Caramon.

They are made-up characters. Something that they have not been particularly proud of, but have come to accept as part of their own existence, like it or not. But that doesn't mean that they still can't complain about the lifestyle forced onto them, as Ryan is now doing.

"Arrrgh! I'm going to kill that author one of these days!"

"Well, maybe if you memorized your lines properly…" began Caramon as he shifted in annoyance from his spot on Chris's shoulder.

"Don't you start with me now! And for the record, I had the lines memorized. I was just…um…improvising!"

"Right. You know how authors feel about that sort of thing. Characters aren't supposed to be uppity, 'cause that's the muses job."

"Give me a break Caramon," said Chris. "Since when does our creator work with muses? I haven't seen a single one so far!"

Caramon snorted. "That's because you don't pay enough attention to him. Of course he has muses, he just uses immaterial ones. That way, they don't get physical whenever he misses a deadline and he doesn't have to talk back at them. Well, not all the time at any rate…"

Ryan grumbled in frustration. "Well, whatever. Anyway, I gotta catch the FanFic express and head down to Odaiba." The FanFic express was how characters bused back and forth between work and home. The trip was almost instantaneous, and characters from all walks of life used it, and the best part was, as long as you were a registered FanFic character, it was free.

Chris looked at Ryan. "How come you gotta go down to Odaiba?"

"Oh, the digidestined leader, Tai Kamiya called. Said he wanted to meet me…"

Chris gasped in surprise. "You're going to meet Tai? THE Tai?"

"Chris, take it easy. It's just Tai…"

"JUST Tai? Oh-ho! Where the heck have you been my friend? It's not just _Tai_! We're talking about the leader of the famous Chosen Children! The first Gogglehead! The Bearer of the Crest of Courage! The… the…oh, for crying out loud Ryan. It's…it's _Tai_!" Chris said the name as though it were something to have emerged from the mouth of God, and was to be taken as holy writ. Ryan raised an eyebrow worriedly.

"Okay, now you're starting to scare me. The way you're acting right now I'd swear that I was talking with Kazu whenever the subject of Ryo Akiyama comes up and not my buddy Chris."

"Tai…" whispered Chris, his eyes taking on a glazed look. "How come you get to meet Tai and not me? You don't even watch the show!"

"First Chris, this isn't a social meeting. Tai wanted to see me because he knew I didn't watch the show, so I wouldn't act like how you are now. And second, he wanted to know if our boss was going to be doing anything more with the digidestined. He wasn't too happy about that one-shot cameo that he and Agumon were in. You remember that one? Where WarGreymon got the stuffing kicked out of him?"

"Tai…" Chris hadn't even been paying attention, so Ryan threw his hands up in disgust.

"Look, I'll see you later, okay? If you want, I'll get you his autograph or something, but I really have to…"

"THAT'S IT! I'm going with you!" Chris screamed.

"Wha…?"

"Please Ryan? I won't mess up your meeting. I just want to bask in the glory that is Tai! Heh, I might even be able to get a good _Tai tan_ just by being in the light that is the Digidestined of Courage!"

_Oh, dear Lord,_ thought Ryan as he sweat dropped. Richoemon tugged at his sleeve.

"Ryan? Is Chris feeling all right? He's acting kind of funny."

Ryan sighed. "Don't worry Richoemon. He's just got a touch of Fanaticism. It's only catching if you've ever watched the TV show."

"But aren't we based off of the show?"

Ryan sweat dropped again. "Point taken. Just…be careful about inhaling when you're around him, all right? And make sure you wash your claws regularly while he's like this."

"Okay."

Chris spun around to look at Ryan, stars filling his eyes causing the boy to unconsciously take a step backwards. "So, when do we leave?"

_I know that I'm going to regret this…_ "Um… as soon as the FanFic express gets here. Hmmm…it's later than usual today. I wonder what's up?"

As they waited, the sky began to darken considerably as ominous clouds began to block out the sun's rays. Lightning danced within them like silver demons. Chris looked at Ryan with a raised eyebrow. Ryan shrugged his shoulders. He wasn't too concerned about it. Lightning storms were just one of a very large number of weird events that occurred in the vicinity of the FanFic domain, but it wasn't quite in the same league as the Demi-Devimon strike from last week. Or even the Tyrannomon/Pikachu riots from two months ago. Now _those_ were weird.

"Don't worry, I'm sure that it's just another plot in the making," said Ryan. "Nothing to worry about."

Chris nodded, but he couldn't shake this feeling of dread that he had.

After a few minutes, a rumbling sound could be heard and the ground suddenly heaved beneath their feet, throwing the foursome to the ground. A second later the FanFic express roared by them. Because of the timing of the express's arrival with the earthquake, they didn't attribute the quake to anything else. Chris and Ryan got up and helped their partners to their feet. Chris stared at the retreating form of the FanFic express. It wasn't stopping.

"Hey," said Ryan. "Did I just see Eric Cartman from South Park lean out the window and yell at us?"

Chris tapped his chin thoughtfully. Now that he thought of it… "Yeah. It sounded like whatever he was saying rhymed with _bass_ and _kicker_."

Ryan frowned. "That doesn't sound right. Wonder if he's got Typo."

"It is a common problem for characters. By the way, I see that the train didn't stop for us. I thought that the FanFic express stopped at the Digimon Branch all the time, no exceptions."

"Well, there was that one time when MaloMyotismon showed up after his reapperance in second season."

"Oh…that's right. Huh. So I guess that we don't have a ride, huh?"

"Not necessarily. There's always other ways."

"Oh, come on," whined Chris.

"Well, I'd better call Tai and let him know that I'm going to be a bit late. Since you're so keen on the idea, why don't you find us a mode of transportation?" Ryan snickered as he left Chris to his fate.

Chris growled in frustration. "All right. I'll try the Google search engine first. Maybe they have a link that we can use or something. Stupid things aren't as reliable though…"

As Chris took out his cell phone and began punching in the numbers, his eyes fell on the building that was the digimon branch of FanFiction.

_That's weird. I don't remember that place having a _'Pet-co.' _sign in place of 'Digimon'._ Chris shrugged as the phone rang and he was turned over to customer service. It wasn't his problem anyway.

Author's Note: Yeah, I'm using my made-up characters for this in conjunction with the regular Digidestined, Tamers (maybe), and Frontier kids (maybe). Why this is will become revealed as the story goes on. Trust me, it's important to how this story is going to be resolved. I'm also considering asking to see if anyone else is interested in having a made-up character thrown in as well, but at this stage I'm still in debate about it. Let me know what you think. R&R please.


	4. Chapter 4

Disclaimer: Again, I don't own Digimon.

The Wages of Fans is Fiction: Chapter 4

There was quite a lot of buzz amongst the Fan Fiction writers as many of them found themselves suddenly and inexplicably locked out of their accounts. Even the ones still able to access their accounts took note that the number of stories stored in the archives on Digimon had shrunk. By a lot! Messages were sent to the Fan Fiction support, demanding an explanation for these events, but so far there was no response. A flurry of angry messages went back and forth between those authors able to get in and a decision was made.

Something had to be done. This had to be investigated. For now though, the calm voice of reason stayed their hands. They would wait a bit, to see if the Support system would answer their letters of inquiry.

For now…

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Izzy was confused. He had the strangest sense of…what could he call it? …Déjà vu? For some reason he kept going to this website, and checking his e-mail as though he were expecting something. He didn't know what he was looking for, and it annoyed him that he couldn't solve it. And there was that thing with Tai and Sora getting married. He didn't know why he thought that there was something wrong with it; for God's sake! They were perfect for each other, and they had been together for years since their adventure into the digital world, so why was it so hard for him to accept?

_Because of Matt…_

Again, he didn't know why he kept thinking that Matt and Sora were together, but there it was. This wasn't a problem that he could solve though; it was more something that needed a psychiatrist and Izzy wasn't too sure if he felt comfortable with the idea that he needed to see a shrink. He didn't _feel _as though he were losing control, at least not yet. But then, does anyone who's crazy really feel that they're losing it?

Izzy decided not to pursue that thought and stick to what he knew, at least for now. As for the website, the one involving fan fiction, he decided to check that out, and see why it called to him. Why it felt as though it had been an integral part of his life.

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Odaiba…

Outside an apartment building a screen appeared and deposited four figures in front of it. The average people just continued on their way, only slightly altering their course so as not to bump into them. This was a common occurrence for them, and they had long since gotten used to it.

The four figures, two human, two digimon, took in the building that they stood before and breathed a sigh of relief.

"I told you," said Chris. "Those links just aren't as reliable. I can't believe that you wanted to use them just to get here!" Chris wasn't too happy about their experience on the Internet. They had gotten lost at least four times just trying to find Tai's apartment building, stumbling into chat rooms, interrupting discussion boards, accidentally becoming a pixel in someone else's fan art. And the worst one of all had them accidentally wandering into the more…unique… to put it mildly…parts of the web. It was after this last part that they just called tech-support and e-mailed themselves to the location.

Ryan glared at Chris. "You know, part of using a link is to look it over before you access it. You have eyes to read with you nimrod, how could you NOT see those three x's before clicking?"

"Well, you were rushing me…"

"Give me a break! That link was more obvious than the idea of T.K. and Kari getting together! I mean if the first clue didn't catch your eye, than the second one should have!"

"Then how come you didn't say anything?"

"Ummmm…"

"Pervert."

"Hey! I wasn't the one who was doing the driving. You were the one who should have been paying attention to the information you were getting on the super highway…"

"HEY! GUYS!"

Ryan, Chris, Caramon, and Richoemon turned their heads to see a red haired boy with a Gaomon jogging towards them. They knew the boy, though they hadn't had the chance to work with him in the past. He was another made-up character that their creator had, well, made up. His name was William.

"Hey Will. What's up?"

William shrugged his shoulders. "Just a weird storm that appeared and disappeared in the time space of five seconds. Did I just hear you guys making corny Internet jokes?"

"Let's…leave that aside for now. So you saw that storm to, huh? Anything special about it or is it just another dramatic plot builder?"

William laughed. "If that was a plot builder than it was short lived. Unless that is you count that earth quake that followed shortly thereafter."

Chris raised an eyebrow. _Earthquake, huh? Interesting._

"What're you doing here anyway?" Asked Ryan.

"Well, seeing as how I'm not part of the regular cast and storyline I've decided to do a little sightseeing of the worlds. Figured that I'd start with the Digidestined realm and work my way up. Seems pretty cool so far. Now what're you guys doing here? I thought the boss would still be having you jumping through hoops in his story."

"Tai called. Said he wanted to talk business. Figured that I might as well take this chance to catch a break before having to…"

"Whoa! Hang on! You're going to see Tai from Digimon?"

"Oh, no. Not you too…"

"Huh? What do you mean _not you too?_ Wait! Is that why he's here?" Will pointed to Chris.

"I have a name," growled Chris.

"Something that he's very aware of," muttered Gaomon at Will's side, but no one paid any attention to him.

Ryan gave Chris a sour look. "He invited himself, and if it wasn't for the fact that I have a soft heart I'd have said no. My loss apparently."

William nodded. "Double-loss, actually. I'm tagging along to."

Ryan groaned. "Three's a crowd."

"Yeah, yeah. But one is the loneliest number, Ryan. Besides, last I checked there were six of us standing here."

"You know, I was so hoping that today was going to be a relaxing day…"

"It is relaxing! Just think of us as hallucinations created from the stress experienced by your troubled mind."

"My mind must be really troubled then…"

"Than it's decided! Let's go talk to Tai! Come on Al!"

Chris blinked. "Al? Who's Al?"

Gaomon groaned. "He's talking about me. He's tried to give me a name ever since I told him about my life growing up in a Gaomon village. Now he just calls me whatever name he thinks of at the moment."

"That's right, Erica."

"ERICA?! Since when did girl names become part of this game of yours?"

"Since this very moment. Now c'mone. Time's a'wastin'. Hiyo Silver!"

Ryan sighed. He just knew that today was going to be a very long day.

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Matt rubbed the side of his face as he staggered home. _How could this have happened?_ Just a second ago life had seemed so good. He was in the company of a woman that he loved dearly, and he had just gotten the nerve to propose to her and she had said yes. They had kissed and he felt as though he could have stayed that way forever, and when she had asked him to say her name he had been more than happy to oblige. The name rolled off his tongue, containing all the sweet whispers of passion that he held in his heart.

Only he had said the wrong name.

_"Sora? Who's Sora?"_ She had asked him, her face first a picture of confusion, and quickly dissolving into one of rage when he didn't give an answer.

Hence the problem with his face and the staggering.

_Why was I thinking about Sora? She's the girlfriend to my best friend! I've never once thought about her that way._

_Have I?_

_Maybe I should talk to Gabumon. He might be able to help._

Matt shook his head sadly, wondering just how things could come to this.

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The boy looked at the words that he had just written. _Where the heck did that come from? _He wondered. That shouldn't have happened. It wasn't how he planned it…was it? He frowned. He had heard from other artists how in the process of creating art the object in question, be it a story or a drawing, could take on a life of its own. He had never believed it before, but here was some proof of it._ No, it couldn't be. It just simply isn't!_

But then, if it wasn't, what was stopping him from simply hitting the backspace button and restarting?

The boy smiled. _Well, maybe it's just to add flavor to the story. Can't have a good story if there isn't some drama to it, can we?_ Smiling, almost evilly, the boy saved the file and began to type again.

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	5. Chapter 5

I would like to take this moment to thank the author Tshk for inspiring me to write this story with the "character's lounge" story, which is a pretty good read, and funny. Thnx! Now, without further ado, on with the fic!

Disclaimer: I don't own Digimon (sounds of quiet sobbing in the background)…

The Wages of Fans is Fiction: Chapter 5

"So, what do you think Sor? Should we set things up for the eleventh?"

Sora Takenouchi looked at her fiancé and smiled gently. "Well, I was kind of thinking of having it on my Mom's birthday. I would like it to be the greatest birthday present that I could give her."

Tai smiled back at her. "Sure. After all, nothing's too good for you…" Tai was interrupted by the sound of knocking on his door. Tai sighed and got up. "I'll be right back," he said. Tai left the kitchen and walked down the hall towards the door, wondering briefly who it could be. _Probably Matt_, he thought though he wasn't sure why he thought this, or felt the slight heat of anger in his heart at the thought of his best friend. He brushed the foreign feeling aside as his hand settled on the doorknob. When he opened the door, all thoughts of Matt flew right out the window as his eyes came upon the sight of three kids that he had never seen before in his life, and standing alongside them were three equally strange digimon, two of which he was sure had never existed until they came up to his apartment. Finding his voice through the shock, Tai greeted them.

"Um…hello?" One of the children, a boy with dark brown hair, cocked an eyebrow at this, but undaunted replied back to him.

"Hey, Tai. It's me, Ryan. I'm here for the…" The boy who had introduced himself as Ryan was knocked aside by the blond haired boy who stood at his left. Tai immediately found his hand in the grasp of the kid and it was being vigorously shaken up and down.

"TAI! Oh, my God! I can't believe that I'm actually meeting you in person! Let me just say what an honor it is to shake hands with the Digi-destined of Courage…"

"Um…you're welcome?" Tai sweat dropped. He wasn't sure what to make of this. They acted like they knew him, but he had never seen them before. Suddenly the red haired kid that was next to Ryan barged in and, after disengaging the blonde haired kid's hand from his, hauled him away.

"Chris! We're here so that Ryan can do business with Tai. You promised, and let me emphasize the word _promise_ here, that you wouldn't interrupt while they're doing that."

"But Will…"

_Business? What's he talking about?_ Thought Tai, bewilderedly.

"NO buts! If you won't keep your promise than I'm dragging you out of here! I won't have you embarrassing the coolness that is Tai, or us for that matter, while we're here. Got it?"

The boy named Chris grumbled before looking sullenly at Tai. "Sorry Tai. Sorry Ryan."

Ryan glared at Chris while Tai looked confusedly at the whole situation. _What the heck is going on here?_

"All right," said Ryan. "If we're done with that little episode, can we take this inside Tai?"

Tai snapped out of his daze. "Look, if you guys are selling something let me tell you now that I don't want it."

Now it was the kid's turn to look perplexed. "Huh?" Went Ryan. "What're you talking about? Yesterday you called asking to set up an appointment with me so that we could talk about you playing any further roles in a story that my boss is writing."

"Sorry, but I don't know what you're talking about. Yesterday I proposed to my girlfriend Sora…" _Wait! Why am I even talking about this with these kids? I don't even know them!_

For some reason though, this felt wrong. But why?

The boy named Will smiled. "You proposed to Sora, huh? Wow. Guess the show was wrong about that one. You know, I always did prefer you over Matt…"

Suddenly, Tai's eyes narrowed. "What do you mean _prefer me over Matt?_ What does Matt have to do with this?"

The three boys looked at each other oddly, as though this situation was completely alien to them.

"Tai?" Asked the brown haired boy. "Is everything alright? I mean, this is common knowledge and everything, especially since you were there when the decision was made, but in the show Matt and Sora were married."

Tai looked at them as though they had just slapped him. For a second his eyes glazed over, but then anger filled them. The boys shifted uncomfortably under his scrutinizing gaze.

"I don't know who you are," hissed Tai. "But I want you gone! And don't ever let me see you around here again!" Tai stepped back and began to close the door. Ryan stepped forward, his hand reaching out to stop the leader of the Digi-Destined.

"Hang on, Tai. What's going on…?"

CRUNCH! The door slammed on Ryan's hand.

"AAAAAH-OW!" Ryan screamed before adding an expletive that caused people from down on the streets to look up in surprise. Tai jerked the door back long enough for the kid to retrieve his hand, and then slammed it shut. The sound of a bolt being thrown could be heard as Ryan nursed his hand, cursing under his breath all the while.

Tai headed back to the kitchen, fuming and muttering under his breath. He felt a little bad about that one kid who got his hand caught in the door, but not quite that bad. _Teach them to try and pull stupid pranks like that._ The question begged though, just how did they know about him and Sora? How did they know him? And Matt? And what about those digimon that were with them? Tai sighed. Maybe he shouldn't have been so harsh like that, but they had made him so _angry_.

"Tai?" Called Sora from within the kitchen. "Is everything all right? I thought I heard someone scream."

Tai smiled, his anger rapidly fading with the memory of those kids. They didn't matter. Nothing mattered except for her. Sora. "It was nothing Sor; just some kids playing a prank. No big deal."

Tai walked out to the kitchen to resume the task that he had been distracted from.

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Ryan stood outside Tai's apartment, his face flushed and his hand red and slightly swollen from the blood rushing to it. He still hadn't stopped cursing.

"Well, um, that was interesting," said Caramon as he looked at Ryan worriedly.

"That's going to leave one heck of an interesting bruise," said William. "How's it feel?"

"It…hurts. What else do you expect?"

"Well, at least we know that the nerves are still working."

Ryan growled another curse, this one so colorful that it would have caused even the most well versed curser to go through several shades of red.

"Ryan," gasped Caramon. "Do you kiss your mother with that mouth?"

"Lay off. It's not like you wouldn't be doing the same thing in my position."

"Hmmm…good point."

"I wonder what that was about?" Asked William, scratching his chin.

"Yeah," said Chris. "I thought that he knew us. Ryan, you wouldn't have been joking about this meeting, would you?"

"Do you think that I would have gotten my hand caught in the door like that if I was? And don't you dare say that you never would have attributed intelligence with me, because we both know that I'm not that stupid!"

Caramon looked at his partner. "He's got a point there, Chris."

Chris opened his mouth to argue, found he couldn't, and closed it.

"Well," began William. "It might not have been Tai that we were talking to."

"Huh?" said Chris, confused. "What're you on, Will? Of course that was Tai. It looked like him…"

"Well, yeah," said William. "But that doesn't necessarily mean anything. It could have been a double."

"A…double." Okay, Chris and Ryan were now officially lost.

"Yeah. I've heard about it while I was memorizing my lines for that story I was in. As you know there are a lot of writers for Fan Fiction; far too many for the characters of the various TV shows to share their time with, so sometimes doubles are hired to fill in for them while the real ones are busy. It doesn't happen often, but there you have it."

Chris looked at Ryan, who simply shrugged.

"I guess that explains the OOCness in some of the stories," said Chris, looking back at William.

"So, what do we do now?" Asked Ryan as he flexed his hand experimentally. It was stiff, and still hurt, but at least nothing was broken. It looked like it was going to be like what William said; he was going to have one heck of a bruise for a while.

"We vacate the premises like he said," said William. "We call the real Tai, explain to him the situation and see if we can't set up a meeting in more 'neutral' territory."

Ryan nodded and the group headed for the elevator.

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The boy stared at his computer screen in shock. _Where had those kids come from? I don't remember writing or reading about them before! How could they appear in my story? With knowledge of the tru…with knowledge of the events from the TV show? And what was this _business_ that they were supposed to discuss with Tai?_ This was completely unexpected. It shouldn't have happened. His finger wavered over the backspace key, trying to work up the nerve to delete them, but found that he couldn't. There was something very wrong about all this. He looked over the characters descriptions, what there was of them, and their reactions to Tai, and suddenly it hit him like a brick.

_They're made-up characters! And more than that, they're someone else's made-up characters! That's why they weren't affected, but there has to be more to it than that. Other fan made characters associated with the Digi-Destined have vanished when I re-wrote the story, so why are they still around? Unless…unless…they were on their own with only brief contact with the Digi-Destined or they're associated with another season!_ The boy laughed. It didn't matter; if he couldn't delete them with the backspace button than he'd just destroy them the old fashioned way.

With a Digimon.

Smiling at the irony of this situation, he scrolled through the list of digimon and found the perfect one. He loaded up the stats and began typing, feeling as though he were a villain out of a digimon story as he did so.

_All right, Chosen Children. Let's see how you handle this…_

_-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------_

Chris, Ryan, and William alongside their digimon had just made it to the streets when they heard the sound of air tearing and an explosion knocked them to the ground. Looking up, Ryan saw a black armored figure with great, clawed gauntlets covering his forearms. He had a split shield like object on his back, and golden scale-like hair came down from underneath his helmet. It was a digimon that Ryan and the others recognized all to well. It was one of the most popular hero/villains of the entire series, and was most renown for his role in the late second season of the TV show.

Black Wargreymon.

"Ho…ly…shit…" Ryan heard Chris say behind him.

Ha! Ha! Yeah, cliffhanger! I'm evil, aren't I? Ha! Ha! R&R please.


	6. Chapter 6

Disclaimer: (blinks) Do I really have to say it? (Sighs) Fine. I don't own Digimon. I do however own Ryan, Chris, William, Richoemon, Caramon, and their digivolved forms.

The Wages of Fans is Fiction: Chapter 6

"Look Koji," growled a boy as he waved a booklet in front of a dark haired boy wearing a blue bandana with gray tiger-like stripes. "I'm telling you for the final time, I want to see some heart put into this scene! Is that so difficult?"

The boy just looked coolly at the kid in front of him. From a distance, he almost looked bored, but as one got closer you could tell that it was more of a distant _I could care less_ look. Even closer you could tell that he was almost amused by the boy glaring at him. He had every reason to be of course; the kid was a writer of fan fiction, and he enjoyed messing with some of them. They took their work much too seriously in his opinion, especially since it was a profession where they didn't get paid. And since they came to him asking for permission to include him in a story that either included romance, adventure, or a mixture of the two, he felt he was entitled to have some fun.

He did save the world after all, even if it was only an imaginary one. So he just looked at the aspiring author and waited. The kid would either grit his teeth and continue with the brow beating and writing, or just quit. This was how he measured an author's worth. If they gave up too soon than they weren't worth his time.

"You're doing this on purpose aren't you?" The kid, whose author name was Pepper of the Red Can, was apparently smarter than Koji had given him credit for, kudos for him. Koji's respect for him just went up a notch, but only a notch. Pepper sighed.

"Look Koji. I'm trying to create something beautiful here. Why can't you make it easier on all of us and work with me he…" Pepper was interrupted from his speech by the ringing of his cell phone. He picked it up. "Hello? Dean? I thought I told you that I'm not to be interrupted while I'm in the process of…" he stopped. Koji's eyes narrowed. Something was up.

"What? What do you mean that over half the Digimon stories are down? And what's this about a fight going on in Odaiba? Well, I don't care! Let the network authorities handle it! Yes, I know fighting outside a fic is illegal, but that's what the authorities are for! They're not responding this time? No, I'm not coming. I'm in the middle of…well fine! Get yourself killed! Stupid…hello? Hello?" Pepper hung up.

"One of these days that idiot is going to get himself killed, eh, Koji?" Pepper looked around, suddenly perplexed. Koji was nowhere to be seen. "Koji?"

Koji had vanished after he heard the words _fight going on in Odaiba,_ come out of Pepper's mouth.

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Odaiba…

A massive orange colored dinosaur crashed to the ground as Black Wargreymon delivered a crushing blow to his skull. As Black Wargreymon advanced on him, a cybernetic reptilian dinosaur rushed at him, two shoulder mounted laser cannons swiveling around on their target.

"LASER DISCHARGE!" the Digimon shouted, and fired twin green-colored energy blasts at Black Wargreymon. The virus type mega staggered a bit under the barrage, but was mostly unharmed and he turned his fury on the cyborg digimon. In the midst of the chaos, a brown haired boy ran up to where the orange dino had fallen.

"Terradramon! Get up! Chris and Metal Dracaramon need our help!" The great saurian groaned and struggled back to his feet, before rushing back into the fight. Terradramon was slowing down, and so was his cybernetic partner Metal Dracaramon. They both had the type advantage that gave them enough of an edge to last this long, but the fact remained; Black Wargreymon was a mega, while Terradramon was a champion and Metal Dracaramon was an ultimate. That and the fact that they were both Dramon type digimon going up against a digimon packing a nasty pair of Dramon Destroyers to boot didn't really help to even the odds.

And what of William and Gaomon?

_Bam! Bam! Bam!_

"TAI! Really powerful digimon out here blowing things up! A little help would not go amiss right now!" As if to emphasize the point William heard the shout "TERRA DESTROYER" followed by an explosion and a scream. Gaomon and William looked over their shoulders nervously, not really liking this sudden complication in their lives. Will wanted to help them, but his partner couldn't digivolve, so the idea of sending a rookie against a mega was out of the question. William sighed. Just what was the deal with Tai right now? He should have been out here like an angry God smiting things left and right long before things got this far.

Unless that is they had cheesed him to the point where he had Agumon digivolve all wrong and decided to sick him on the poor kids. If that was the case he hoped that the Fanfic supervisors got here fast.

_It was just a stupid comment,_ William thought. _I thought he knew what went on in the show; I mean he was there when it happened! And he's been in every single piece of fan fiction that stars him and Sora or even Matt and Sora without so much as complaining, so why does he freak out now? Maybe this is a double or something, albeit a very fanatic double. And why the heck hasn't he come out to investigate? We're causing enough of a commotion to attract the attention of every Digi-Destined from here to Santa Fe. You'd think that the army would have gotten involved by this point, even if they're just a fan fic army who never seem to win. _Looking back at the fight he held back a gasp. Terradramon was down again and leaking data, while Metal Dracaramon was currently playing 'tag' in the sky with their foe.

"Oh, man," said William. "This is not going well."

"Will?" Asked Gaomon. "Why don't they just digivolve their partners to mega? I thought that the author had all their levels planned out."

"Well, he does," replied William. "The thing is, he put a lock on their digivices to keep them from digivolving any higher than their published form until it was time to introduce the new form. Has something to do with his _anti-spoiler _policy I think."

Gaomon sweat dropped. "Oh terrific. What a wonderful idea. Can I just start digging a hole for us to live in now or should I let Black Wargreymon do the job for us?"

"Bill, you can be such a pessimist." William turned back towards Tai's apartment door. "Tai! We are getting butchered out here! If you don't come out this instant I'm going to knock the door down and then knock you down! You've got five seconds! Five…"

Metal Dracaramon screamed as Black Wargreymon kicked him out of the sky. William cursed.

"Oh, screw it. One." William kicked at the door hard. Though it shook visibly it didn't so much as budge.

"Nice job, Hercules," said Gaomon sarcastically.

William sighed. "Gaomon? If you don't mind…" William stepped to the side, and Gaomon smirked.

"With pleasure," he said, cracking his knuckles through his boxing gloves.

"GAO RUSH!" Gaomon shouted as his fists made contact with the door. The door flew off its hinges and disappeared into a murky fog like substance that enveloped the inside of the apartment.

"What the…?" William and Gaomon said in unison. They couldn't see anything, except for a dark, featureless mist. William crazily wondered if they had pissed Tai, or rather his double, off to the point where he summoned up the Dark Ocean in his own apartment.

_This isn't good,_ William thought as he slowly, and tentatively reached out towards the fog, only to draw it back as electricity leapt the gap between it and his fingers. William pulled back his hand with a hiss and stuck the shocked fingers in his mouth.

"You just had to touch, it didn't you? What was it that they said about curiosity killing cats?"

"Whoever _they _are, yeah they're right about that, except that satisfaction also brought it back. Besides, I'm a firm believer of the _burnt hand teaches best_ philosophy."

"You certainly have the _burnt hand_ part down. Now what are we going to do?"

William looked back at the fight, then at the other apartment rooms. A thought occured to him.

"Gaomon, go 'knock' on the other doors and see if anyone else is home."

"Uh, okay." Gaomon walked up to the nearest apartment door and leapt at it.

"GAO RUSH!" He shouted and the door went down like a domino. William and Gaomon looked in awe at what they saw, and were silent for a moment.

"Just as I thought," said William, and then the sound of a crash caught their attention. The two partners rushed to the railing and took a look at the situation. William frowned.

"Who's the new digimon?" Asked Gaomon.

Metal Dracaramon fell to earth with a resounding crash after Black Wargreymon had kicked him down like a demented soccer player. He struggled to get up and failed, reverse digivolving in the process. Chris looked over at Ryan, who was holding his own partner (who had suffered the same fate as Caramon) carefully. Chris hung his head in resignation. To think that it would end like this, and before their first story was completed too! His next thought was uncharacteristically selfish.

_This is so unfair!_ Chris ran up to Caramon and gently cradled him in his arms; the little lizard coughed a bit and looked up at him. "Chris?" He whispered.

"Don't…don't try to talk. It'll all be over soon."

Above them, Black Wargreymon brought his hands together and formed a red sphere between them. Lifting his arms above his head the crimson sphere grew in size, glowing like a star.

"TERRA DESTROYER!" Black Wargreymon shouted, and hurled the sphere towards them. Chris closed his eyes and waited for the end.

An end that didn't come.

Opening his eyes carefully, Chris's mouth gaped as he saw what saved them standing before them. It was massive; easily the size of a Greymon, only covered in gray and violet armor, and a shield was slung over his back. And it held Black Wargreymon's Terra Destroyer as though it were a beach ball. Chris blinked, trying to process what he was seeing, and blinked again. He looked over at Ryan, who seemed equally stunned, and then at Black Wargreymon, who looked mad enough to chew nails and spit out staples.

_Um…not that I'm complaining or anything, but what the heck is going on here?_ Pulling out his digivice he called up the analyzer program to see just what type of digimon this thing was.

What he got came as a complete surprise.

DEAN

Author Class: VETERAN

Special Attack: Fan Fic Flame, Shotgun Musings

Genre: Action/Adventure, Romance

_What…the…hell…?_ Chris stopped in his thoughts as the entity that his digivice identified as 'Dean' spoke.

"I sensed a disturbance in the balance of the fan fics. Something has been altered in the storyline, so I have come to correct the change." Dean looked at the children behind him, noticing a red haired one with a Gaomon running towards them. He recognized them from a story that he had read a while ago. "This guy giving you trouble?" He asked, indicating Black Wargreymon. The two closest to him nodded mechanically.

"Okay. Why don't you kids run along? I'll take care of this clown." And with that, the being rushed towards Black Wargreymon, shouting something about Sora and Matt forever.

William pulled up next to Chris and Ryan, who just looked dumbly at this sudden and completely unforeseen turn of events. William was no less awestruck.

"Guys?" He asked. "Did we just get saved by a Sorato supporter?"

Chris snapped out of his stupor. "Uh…yeah, I guess so. I mean that's what it sounded like. Oh, man. Guess that means that there's no way that Tai is going to want to help us now. In fact, he may want to kill us himself just because we were saved by that guy."

"I don't think that he'd be able to help us anyway, even if he wanted to."

Ryan and Chris looked at him confusedly. "Huh? What do you mean?"

William just started running away from them. "Look, we'll talk about it later, let's just get the heck out of here before we get caught in the crossfire."

Ryan and Chris looked at each other, and then at their digimon, before following in pursuit. They had to admit, William certainly made a lot of sense when the threat of impending annihilation was at their heels.

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A/N: I apologize to any authors who actually go by the names 'Pepper of the Red Can' and 'Dean'. I just needed some weird author names, and those seemed to fit the bill. There are just so many writers out there that it's simply a matter of chance if your names do happen to come up in the story (though I suppose that I could have used the search function to double-check on pen names, but I'm just too lazy for that). So let me just inform you that I'm not using anyone's name without his or her permission, nor am I slamming anybody. I'm just writing this fic purely for fun, and basing it off of what I've observed in other author's writings. And no, I'm not playing favorites either, as I have every intention of having a good laugh even at my own expense. I just hope that everyone who reads this is open minded and has enough of a sense of humor to laugh with me.

Finally, before I close, I'd like to thank everyone who has taken the time to review this story. Thanks you guys! You make this experience that much more enjoyable. 'Till next time then.

10


	7. Chapter 7

The Wages of Fans is Fiction: Chapter 7

Disclaimer: I do not own Digimon, emphasis on the 'do' and 'not'.

Izzy busily typed away on his computer, analyzing the situations, cross-referencing stories, comparing data. Nothing yet seemed out of the ordinary though, and it was all he could do to keep himself from going insane.

And to think, this is what he did to relax.

_I still don't understand why I'm attracted to this site. All it has is nothing but Fan Fiction on various television shows. So why…?_

Izzy's thoughts halted when he saw one title containing a familiar name. _Revenge of Diaboramon: Director's Cut_.

_What…?_ Izzy brought the mouse to the link and was about to click it, when a pair of arms wrapped themselves around his neck. A familiar, ditzy voice cooed to him a second later.

"Izzy? Honey? Is there a chance that you could tear yourself from that computer for just a second? I could use your input on something."

"GAAAH!" Izzy screamed and jumped up, knocking over his chair, causing the person behind him to leap back in surprise. Izzy turned to see who it had been that snuck up on him. "Mimi! What are you doing here?!"

The girl known as Mimi pouted. "That's not very funny, Izzy. It was your idea that we live together…"

"Oh," said Izzy hurriedly as he sweat dropped. "Sorry, Mimi. It's just that I was in the middle of something rather…important…and I didn't hear you come in."

"You're always _in the middle of something important_. Aren't I important too?"

Izzy held up his hands in a warding gesture, as though it could protect him from the miffed female. "Of course you are, Mimi. Now, what was it that you wanted my opinion on?" He looked his girlfriend over and raised an eyebrow. "Let me guess; New dress?"

"IZZY!" The girl screeched. Izzy took a step back and bumped into his desk. He immediately regretted those words. Mimi wasn't really wearing a dress; it was more of a mini-skirt.

"Izzy Izumi," the girl began, turning away from him. "I'll have you know that I bought this last week during a special clearance week and you said then that you liked it."

_Yeah, and it nearly upset my credit balance buying it as I recall,_ thought the computer genius but he didn't say it. He didn't want Mimi to get any more upset than she was already.

"Look, why don't you just tell me what it is you want me to talk about?"

The girl huffed and straightened her back in insulted pride. "I don't know why I even talk to you Izzy. Sometimes I think you take me for granted."

Izzy held back a sigh. She always did this to him when he messed up. It wasn't his fault really, he just wasn't used to having to experience emotions beyond his computer (even after all these years, from the digital world on up), but Mimi was helping him with that, and to some extent she was succeeding. But breaking him from what she had once called _computer dark mode_ was something that would take a lot of patience, probably more than Mimi could spare, but then, that was his department in their relationship.

Placing a hand on her shoulder, Izzy said softly, "Hey, why don't I make it up to you? I know that there's a pair of shoes out there just waiting with your name on them." Mimi turned to him and giggled as she threw her arms around the young man, making him stumble back in surprise.

"Oh, Izzy. You just say the sweetest things. You make me want to faint on my feet sometimes…"

Izzy laughed lightly. "And maybe afterwards, you can tell me what's on your mind."

The girl giggled again and, taking him by the hand, dragged him to the door. Izzy protested at first, but quickly relented. Now was not the time for that sort of thing. Still, he did sneak a glance over his shoulder at his computer screen, and what he saw chilled him to the bone.

The story title was gone.

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Matt wandered through the streets until he finally reached his apartment building. His face had a dead, empty look as he stepped inside and headed for the elevator, and when said elevator deposited him on his floor his expression hadn't changed one bit. He mechanically strode towards his door, unlocked it, and stepped inside. Once he had entered the room his partner and friend, Gabumon, a rookie digimon with blue fur and resembling a wolf with a horn on his head walked up to him. His expression first one of mirth until he got a good look at his friends face.

"Matt?" He asked. The blonde haired man didn't say anything. He just simply tossed his coat on the nearest chair and sat down heavily in it, looking at his hands with a blank face.

"Matt?" Gabumon repeated. "Is everything all right?"

Matt turned his face towards his friend, and Gabumon gasped. Matt's face held what had to be one of the ultimate expressions of misery on his face, something that happened to him. He looked so…so lost. It was as if he didn't know who he was anymore. After a few seconds, Matt spoke.

"Ga-Gabumon. I – I am such an idiot…" he said shakily.

Gabumon said nothing, waiting for his friend to continue.

"It's about Sharon," he said. Gabumon nodded. He knew that Matt had been head over heels for this young lady for quite some time. What could have happened between them that would have reduced Matt to…to this state?

But before Matt could say anything else, a knock came at his door. Sighing, Matt got up and walked over to the door, and opened it, only to step back in surprise a second later as a teenager in a purple jacket and gray t-shirt fell in and collapsed to the floor. He looked like he had been badly roughed up, as his clothes were torn and burnt in multiple places, and his face sported some nasty cuts and bruises. Matt stared at the kid, all his worries and problems blown out the window in a moment, at least for now. Kneeling down, he turned the kid over on his back and took a look at his face.

_Why does he look so familiar?_ Wondered Matt. The teenager slowly opened his eyes, and looked at Matt in the eyes. He smiled weakly. Matt could see that it took a lot of effort.

"Matt," the boy whispered. "Glad to see you again. Going…going to need…your…he…e…lp…" They boy trailed off as he passed out. Matt looked at him, and then at Gabumon in shock. The kid knew him. But how? He had never seen him before in his life, and yet…he felt as though he should have.

Getting up Matt grabbed the teen by his arms and instructed Gabumon to take the legs, and together they dragged him over to the couch in the living room.

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The boy sat at his computer; sweat trickling down his forehead, and his eyes wide with shock at what had transpired. He had not expected this to happen. Not at all. Just a second ago he had those bratty pretenders right where he wanted them. Everything was going so smoothly, he had even been able to dampen the area down using his author abilities so as to keep the other Digi-Destined from entering the fight. So, where had this…this…_thing_ come from? It wasn't like any other digimon he had seen before, and according to what he had written, it wasn't even a digimon. Black Wargreymon hadn't been able to identify it as one. And that wasn't all there was. When the creature attacked, it had shouted "Sora and Matt Forever!" And then, then it was all he could do to keep Black Wargreymon alive. Not that it helped much, since at that very moment he had, quite literally, lost control of the story as the keyboard starting typing in the words by themselves, writing the story in his place up until the battle ended in a draw, with Black Wargreymon retreating and the creature…he did not know its fate. Black Wargreymon did not so much as look back while he was flying away. _The coward,_ the boy thought. He looked over what had been written, and a sneaking suspicion began to grow in his mind.

_Matt and Sora forever, huh? I wonder…_

If, if he was right about the nature of this enemy, then he could very well be in for a world of trouble. Unless that is, he brought even more chaos to all the worlds, all the seasons of Digimon. He had been able to lock out some of the authors before when he first made his move into the 01 and 02 seasons, and who knows? If he played his cards right, he just might be able to win some of them over to his cause.

Smiling evilly, the boy set his fingers back on the keyboard and began to write once more.

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Koji slammed the payphone back on the hook. _Of all the times for Takuya to be 'out', it has to be when things get serious._ He couldn't really blame the guy, they all had duties to perform, even if they were no longer just restricted to a Saturday morning television program. _Looks like I'll just have to get to Odaiba on my own. _He could have of course just allowed the network authorities handle this one, but since he had heard that, for whatever reasons, they weren't responding to the crisis and that wasn't good. Not in Koji's book. A flicker of motion caught his attention and he looked up at the sky. There appeared to be hundreds of shooting stars coming down to earth.

_What's going on here?_

_-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------_

Far above the streets below, upon a rooftop, a cloaked figure watched carefully as the streaks of light fell to the ground. Looking down at a short, gray furred wolf with bat-like wings sitting at his side he said, "Well. It looks as though the authors have come to town."

The wolf nodded grimly.

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A/N: Ouch. This was my first time ever writing Mimi, and I gotta say, it was hard. I had to pour over old episodes, discard all my notions about stereotyping, and cut my sentences in half (leaving out too many big words while still making Mimi sound intelligent) and I'm still not sure if I got her in character. At the same time, I had to get a bead on Mimi's relationship with Izzy (which wasn't as hard as I thought it was going to be. I saw a scene from "Revenge of Diaboramon" to thank for that) just to get an idea where to go with them for this fic. Tshk, sorry if I made their relationship too cheesy, but I figured that it was best to stick them in the middle of their relationship rather than at the beginning (trust me, it really would have been cheesy if I went down that road. I would've choked). I hope to do better in the future. Anyway, now the author's are coming to town, and all hell is about to break loose. And just who is this cloaked figure you might ask? Heh, you may want to ask Dag 417 about that one. Anyway, 'till next time.

8


	8. Chapter 8

Disclaimer: I don't own Digimon. I'd be lying if I said otherwise…

The Wages of Fans is Fiction: Chapter 8

When it comes to humanity, people have the tendency to regard their beliefs as being immensely important. For some there is a desire to protect that belief at all costs, regardless of the consequences to others and the effects that it has on those lives that get hurt in the crossfire. And when those of likeminded beliefs get together, we have a strengthening of bonds even between people who otherwise would have nothing to do with each other. And when this bond is coupled with a near fanatical desire to protect that belief we get what we call a 'mob mentality', at which point a human being is almost impossible to reason with and all sense of individuality becomes lost in the chaos that follows. All one can do when confronted with that chaos is react and ride the wave, hoping beyond hope that they'll come out of it okay.

As always though, in the sea of madness there is going to be some semblance of sanity, a beacon of light for the lost to reach towards. All one has to do is look for that light and reach for it.

The following describes the efforts of those who are looking for that light just as the storm is about to break.

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"You have got to be kidding me." That was what Ryan had said about the time that William had finished telling them about what he thought was up with Tai during their encounter with Black Wargreymon. He had told Ryan and Chris of the black mist that filled Tai's apartment room, and that of the neighbors. He had told them of his hypothesis that an author was behind Tai's reaction to them, behind Black Wargreymon, and behind the fog that cut them off from contact with people during the battle with the Mega digimon. When Chris asked him how he could possibly know about such an occurrence Will had told them of an adventure that he had in another author's story. He had, quite accidently wandered in and when the author noticed she had wrapped him up in some kind of fog that removed him from the area while at the same time keeping him in the same place. Kind of like dimensional shifting or something like that, which brings us back to Ryan's response to William's explanation.

"You have got to be kidding me." Yes, that was what he had said when William told them about his theory. That was around the same time that the lights started to fall from the sky, so it was hard to tell precisely what context he was speaking of, though neither William or Chris had really noticed right away, until Caramon tapped Chris's forehead and pointed it out to them.

"What the…" said William as he looked up at the sky, not at all comprehending what was going on here. Even for the FanFic domain, this was really weird.

"I gotta say," said Caramon voice full of wonder. "If that's plot building, then that is some pretty damn good foreshadowing they got going on. Chris, you sure that you don't want to trade authors?"

"Caramon, now's not the time for that sort of thing."

"Ohhh…"

Ryan looked at the sky, noticing that it began to darken as the number of lights falling to earth increased. He frowned as he suddenly had a really bad feeling about what was going to happen when those lights landed.

"Guys," he said. "I really think that we should get out of here."

"Capital idea Jeeves," said Chris mockingly. "Got an idea as to where we should go?"

"I've got no preferences at this point, so I'm open to suggestions. For now though, anywhere but here would probably do quite nicely."

"Okay," said William. "I'll see about calling up a web link…"

"NO!" Shouted Ryan, Chris, Caramon, and Richoemon. William gave them a weird look.

"Look guys. I know that those things aren't very reliable as a means of transportation…"

William was interrupted as a white-hot fireball tore into the ground, knocking the kids off their feet and raining chunks of debris on them. The kids and digimon waited for a few seconds before raising their heads and getting to their feet to inspect the damage.

"Okay, who started the war?" Asked Chris grumpily as they approached the newly formed crater. Smoke still rose from its depths, obscuring their vision.

"Helloooo…" Richoemon called. "Anyone still alive in there?" Ryan looked at his partner with a baffled expression on his face.

"Richoemon, do you really expect the meteor to answer back?"

A pair of red, glowing eyes appeared from within the smoke, and the kids jumped back.

"I stand corrected," apologized Ryan.

A massive, beetle-like figure climbed its way out of the hole and stood before them menacingly. It looked them over, disgust plain on its face.

"Well, well, well…" it said in a low, dark voice. "More wanna-be Digi-destined."

"Um…hello?" said Caramon as Chris pulled out his digivice and called up the analyzer program.

DIGIDESTINED OF DARKNESS

Author Class: BEGINNER

Special Attack: Adamant Claw, Carapace Crusher

Genre: Horror, Angst, Mystery, Romance

"Digidestined of Darkness, huh?" Said Chris in a mocking tone. "I've heard of you. Not quite as I envisioned. You know, your names too long for me to use for conversational purposes, dude. How about D&D?"

Digidestined of Darkness's eyes narrowed to slits. Ryan and William looked back and forth between the creature and Chris, with Ryan wondering just what the heck was going through Chris's mind at this moment.

"Chris," said William. "You know this guy?"

"Yeah, believe it or not, he's an author for the FanFic domain. He only joined up last week and still doesn't have a story to his name. In fact, he spends most of his time telling other author's just how bad their fics are, isn't that right, D&D?"

The creature that Chris had identified as an author hissed viciously.

"What?" Chris asked, smiling. "You don't like that one? Okay, how about…Dee Dee?"

Digidestined of Darkness charged towards them, roaring with rage.

"Nice job, Chris," said Ryan and William at the same time as they all scattered.

"What? I thought he liked Dexter's Laboratory! That's what he said in his last review!"

"ADAMANT CLAW!" Shouted Digidestined of Darkness as he struck at Chris, who just barely dodged the blow.

"Jeez, take a chill pill man. It's just a show…" This sadly did nothing to improve Digidestined of Darkness's attitude as he made another attempt at crushing Chris.

"And you go on about Terriermon being too mouthy in battle," said Caramon sarcastically.

"NUKE FLAME!" Shouted Richoemon as he breathed a stream of fire on the Digidestined of Darkness. The author fell back a pace, glaring at Richoemon and Ryan, who glared back with determination in their eyes. William and Gaomon joined them a second later.

"Whatsa matter?" Taunted Gaomon. "The heat too much for you? If you can't take the flames, than stay out of the fiction!"

"Gaomon…" William scolded.

"All right," said Ryan. "What's the deal here? Why are you attacking us? If this is because of Chris's terrible sense of humor can't we just have him apologize and then go our way, 'cause frankly, I'd like to go home sometime today and I don't mean sent home in a box."

Digidestined of Darkness was silent for a moment. When he spoke, his words had all the relentlessness of a tidal wave, all the inevitability of death. Darkness filled his words, and it sought to break the spirits of the children standing before him.

In short, he was utilizing his horror and angst genres as he talked to them.

"One word. One tale. All others are irrelevant. You, who are not meant to be, do not belong here. Therefore, I shall remove you, so as to please the great Lord of the Fantasy. His story shall stand over all, and no other shall come before it. In payment for my assistance, I shall have the part in the story that I desire. The role that should be…"

_And he says that we shouldn't be, _thought Chris.

"Cut the drama," spat Ryan.

"Ryan," said William. "According to my digivice, drama isn't part of his regular genre…"

"Oh shut it. It's just an expression. Anyway, cut the drama. This is supposed to be a free site. Remember the policy of _Free Speech_? Who are you or anyone to say that we shouldn't exist for the purpose of entertaining others?"

"Who are you to interfere in what hasn't been determined?" Shot back Digidestined of Darkness.

"Huh?" Asked Ryan, confused.

"What's he talking about?" Asked William.

"Got me…"

"Enough of this!" Shouted Digidestined of Darkness as he charged towards the two children. Richoemon and Gaomon positioned themselves in front of their partners. Richoemon and Caramon were too weak from their earlier battle with Black Wargreymon to digivolve and Gaomon couldn't digivolve at all. It didn't matter though. They had every intention of going down fighting.

"CARAPACE CRUSH…!" Began Digidestined of Darkness, but he never finished his sentence.

"SHADOW BLAZE!" Shouted another voice from the out of the shadows. A black flame smashed into Digidestined of Darkness, knocking him to the ground. The three kids looked over to where the attack had come from, and out of the darkness emerged a cloaked figure with a bat-winged wolf by his side.

"And here I was starting to think that you wouldn't need rescuing from a Beginner. Heh, guess I was wrong on that account."

"Who are you?" Demanded Chris as he joined his comrades. The cloaked figure raised his right hand and shook his finger, as though scolding a child who had been naughty.

"We'll have introductions later. For now, you should think about keeping yourselves safe. F.Y.I., you should never turn your back on your enemy."

"Wha…?" began Ryan as he turned just in time to see Digidestined of Darkness rushing towards them again. The cloaked figure sighed in exasperation.

"Dagmon? If you would be so kind?"

"SHADOW BLAZE!" The wolf sent out another stream of black fire, smashing into Digidestined of Darkness. A second later, the author vanished, screaming in pain. Ryan and the others looked at their rescuer with shocked expressions on their faces.

"You…you killed him."

The cloaked stranger waved him off. "Relax," he said. "He's an author. He just got kicked off of his account. He'll be back though, and when he is we'd better be out of here." Activating the device attached to his wrist, a screen popped up and he gestured them to go through. Ryan recognized it as a link. Apparently it was a damn good one, because just by looking at it he recognized where they were going.

"Why are we going to Shinjuku Park?"

The cloaked figure shrugged. "Partly because what's been going on has so far has been contained to only the first two seasons of Digimon, and also because it happens to be the world that I'm more heavily based on. I feel comfortable there. You could say that it's my kind of fighting turf." He pulled off his hood, revealing a boy only a little older than any of Ryan and his friends, with mid-length black hair and glasses. It occurred to Ryan that he had never seen this kid before, and it dawned on him as to what the nature of his identity was. Ryan approached the kid and held out his hand, which the boy took good-naturedly.

"I'm Reno," said the boy with a small smile. "I believe that you already know Dagmon." Ryan nodded.

"Always a pleasure to meet an OC," he said.

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A/N: Okaaaay…I'm still not sure at this point, but I've decided to take requests for OC characters. Don't know if I'll be able to fit them into the story right now, so you might want to wait until I've definitely reached a decision (I made an exception with Reno and Dagmon because his creator Dag 417 gave me permission to do so, and I got an idea on what to do with him shortly afterwards). If you want to submit characters anyway then send it to my e-mail account. Just make sure that they are original, and that their partners have their evolutions planned out with descriptions and all that fun stuff. It also helps if they've already been featured in a story so that I can get the low-down on their personalities. Just don't throw in too many characters all right? I've got enough on my plate as it is without turning this into a really huge saga (unless that's what you guys want).

Anyway, read, review, and peace forever (ironic statement considering what I write is far from peaceful). 'Till next time guys.

5


	9. Chapter 9

Disclaimer: And yet again, another chapter in a story for a TV show that I do not own…

The Wages of Fans is Fiction: Chapter 9

How it is that Izzy Izumi ends up carrying Mimi's shopping bags on these little incursions of the type that she calls 'shopping' he'll never know. A person of lesser intellect might be able to answer him, having a better grasp of the more simple things of life, but even I doubt that. With the Digi-destined known as Mimi, one would have to have a heart of stone or a heart of pure evil just to say 'no' when she went off on a shopping spree. Though to be honest, Izzy could already feel his credit balance tipping to the point of no return, so he was starting to reach the point where he would have to 'politely' tell her that this was enough clothes buying for one day. Now if only he could distract her long enough to get a word in edgewise.

"Mimi?" Izzy began.

"Oh, Izzy! I don't believe this is on sale! And at half price too! Oh, we've just got to get it!"

"Mimi…isn't this enough for one day?" Izzy asked as he felt his arms tremble at having to carry the collective weight of his girlfriends' prizes for the past two hours. And his feet weren't doing him any favors either.

"That's the trouble with you Izzy, you just don't know a good deal when you see one! If we get this now we'll save a whole lot of money!"

Izzy couldn't help but think of the money that they'd be saving if they didn't get these things at all. Distantly he heard the sound of thunder, but dismissed it. Had he been just a few years younger, he probably wouldn't have done that so casually. He would have remembered that the day was clear and sunny with no chance of rain at all anywhere in the forecast.

Fortunately for both him and Mimi, their partners Palmon and Tentomon, who were a ways off happened to notice the strange events that were occurring, including the figures that were now falling towards the skylight.

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Koji had been a little taken aback when the sky literally started 'falling', and his surprise only increased from there as strange digimon like creatures started emerged from where what he had initially thought of as meteors landed. Not one to take chances with this sudden development he took out his D-Tector.

"EXECUTE!" He shouted as a ring of data materialized around his left hand. Bringing it into contact with his D-Tector, sparks flew and he pulled them apart, sending the data around his hand outwards to encircle his body.

"SPIRIT EVOLUTION!" The data settled into a grid like pattern, as though it were fitting him for a change of wardrobe. As the transformation ended, Koji was covered in light-blue armor, with stripes, and a wolf-like helmet covering his face. Koji assumed a defensive stance, waiting for the newcomers to make the first move. There were three of them, one vaguely resembling a Devimon in terms of its long spindly limbs, dark coloring, and tattered wings, but resemblances ended there. In fact Koji couldn't even see any features on it at all. Space almost seemed to warp around the creature, as though it were a black hole sucking in the light around it. The next one looked a little like a cross between a Samurai and a Knight, complete with silver armor and an obscenely large sword that no living human could possibly wield correctly, and lastly just a regular kid, though he wore a black trench coat and shades. He had his arms crossed and looked completely and totally unconcerned with the situation.

"Fan out," said the kid in the trench coat. "We are to find those kids at all costs, understand? Destroy anything that gets in your way _except _the characters. The Lord of Fantasy has plans for them. If you do happen to encounter them and they resist, immobilize them, but do _not _kill them. Things are going to be hard enough without having to write a resurrection story just to bring them back to life. Is that understood?"

The other two nodded, and the knight/samurai leapt up into the air while the shadow figure melted into the shadows. The trench-coat kid took a look around, and with an air of authority, took off his shades and looked in Koji's direction.

"Hello Lobomon. I don't believe that we've had the pleasure of meeting."

Koji crouched. He did not like this at all. Whatever was going on here, it sounded like it was going to be bad.

The kid laughed. "Not very chatty are we? Doesn't matter. I'm not interested in you. Never have been frankly. Your series wasn't _quite _up to measuring up to my tastes."

"Are you an author?" Asked Koji.

The kid laughed. "Yes. As a matter of fact I am. I happen to be a Matrix fan with only a passing interest in Digimon, but I have been promised a great many things. A ringside seat for the greatest battle of the century for the control of destiny and my own part to play in it. How cool is that, huh? Well, love to stay and chat, but I've got errands to run." He paused and regarded Koji. "You know, you could get a piece of the action too. My employer would be grateful for your assistance and will allow you the chance to change something from the show that you were dissatisfied with. All you have to do is make my job just a little bit easier, by telling me where I can find three children. Just a small thing, and I promise that they won't be harmed."

Koji absorbed this, hanging on to every word. He wasn't sure just how much of this was going to be important, so he listened, and he listened carefully. "What do they look like?" Koji asked.

The trench coat kid smiled. "I knew that you'd see wisdom in my words," he said and began to rattle off their descriptions. Koji paid close attention, and when the kid was done, Koji thought about them. He had a pretty good mental image of them, and after a moments consideration he realized that he knew them. Or rather he knew some people who knew them. They were a fairly recent addition to the world of fan fiction.

"What could your boss want with them?" Koji asked. The kid frowned.

"It's not your job to ask questions Koji," he said with a hint of anger in his voice. "Just tell me if you've seen them or not, and if you have where they were. I'll share the rewards with you, and believe me when I say that the rewards will be great."

_That has got to be the most overused and clichéd bad guy line in the whole universe,_ Koji thought. Smiling beneath his mask Koji drew a twin pair of energy sword from his sides. The kid in the trench coat suddenly looked uncertain.

"Lobomon? What are you doing?"

"You know, I really don't know what this whole thing is about. Frankly, I don't even like all this talk about _controlling destiny_ and _changing things that I'm dissatisfied with_. I've heard talk like that before and I wasn't too impressed with it then, especially when it's combined with _destroy anything that gets in your way_. Plus, those kid's that you're talking about; I've heard of them, and what I've heard has been some good things. Can't imagine what they must have done to get on your boss's bad side, but I'm willing to bet that they had a pretty damn good reason for it. So I'm thinking that I'll take a page out of Takuya's book and just beat you senseless and get some more answers out of you later when you're not so up to fighting. What do you think?"

The kid sighed. "I guess that I should have expected this out of you Koji. You wield the spirits of light after all, and you have the heart of a warrior. You're not the kind of person to be swayed by _gifts _and _promises of power_. Still, I had to try." The boy cracked his knuckles. "I'm going to enjoy this."

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Fast-forward a bit.

"IZZY!" Tentomon shouted as the skylight shattered above them. Izzy and Mimi both turned in Tentomon's direction to see what he was shouting about, to see a cybernetic wolf digimon crash to the ground heavily, and it's path of descent was followed by a child of perhaps 12 years old, wearing a dark trench coat. The wolf digimon, whom Tentomon immediately recognized as KendoGarurumon (though how he knew he didn't quite know himself), struggled to get up, only to be kicked back down. Grabbing KendoGarurumon by his legs, the kid swung him around and released him, letting him fly into the store that just seconds ago Mimi had been admiring the merchandise from.

"NO!" Mimi shrieked, though whether over the hapless digimon or the store could not be determined as her digivice began to emit a blinding light. A second later, Izzy's followed suit, and both Tentomon and Palmon were enveloped in the light that signifies digivolution.

"PALMON!"

"TENTOMON!"

"DIGIVOLVE TOOO…"

"TOGEMON!"

"KABUTERIMON!"

As the light died down, the two champion level digimon were revealed. One, a walking cactus with boxing gloves and the other an insectoid like digimon with wings. They moved between the weakened KendoGarurumon and the strange child who simply smirked at them.

"Be careful Togemon!" Called Mimi. "Remember that he's human, so try not to hurt him!"

"I don't think that hurting him is something that she has to worry about Mimi," said Izzy. Mimi was about to ask what he meant before realizing the obvious. If this boy was able to handle a digimon like KendoGarurumon then he was likely to be able to stand up to Togemon and Kabuterimon as well. The boy looked at them, never losing his smirk once.

"The famous Digi-destined Izzy and Mimi. I see that my master has made a good choice when it came to you two. I always thought that you contrasted each other well. I don't have time however to stay for idle chitchat however. I have a job to do and I don't want to delay. When Koji wakes up, tell him that he was a fool for not joining me." And with that he leapt into the air.

"Kabuterimon," shouted Izzy. "Don't let him get away!"

The huge insect digimon lifted off the ground and flew towards the boy, who simply responded by spinning in the air and knocking Kabuterimon away from him with a kick, sending him crashing to the ground into Togemon. Using the momentum from the kick the boy sailed through the air towards the store across from them, and disappeared in a stream of data. The words _logging out_ could be heard as he made his exit. Izzy and Mimi ran towards their partners who had both reversed digivolved by this point, and after making sure that they were okay, headed into the remains of the clothes store that Mimi had been so captivated by earlier and found, in the place of KendoGarurumon, a battered boy wearing a yellow t-shirt and a blue jacket, with a blue bandana tied around his head.

"Are you all right?" Asked Izzy. But the boy didn't respond. He was unconscious.

"We'd better get him out of here," said Mimi. "Are you two going to be okay with walking on your own?" She asked looking over at Tentomon and Palmon, who both nodded reassuringly. Helping her boyfriend with Koji, the two got the boy to their car, noticing the strange lack of people in the mall that they had left.

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"Ooooh…" groaned the boy on Matt's couch as he opened his eyes. He took in his surroundings slowly and sat up.

"Matt! Matt!" Called a Gabumon from next to him, and the boy nearly freaked. A blonde haired adult rushed into the living room.

"Gabumon! What's up? Is he awake?" Looking over at the couch he quickly found his answer.

"Matt…" the boy whispered.

"It's about time you woke up," said Matt as he picked up a glass of water from the coffee table and gave it to the boy, who drank it gratefully. After he was done, Matt proceeded with the grilling.

"All right. Care to tell me who you are, and how you happen to know my name? I don't recall ever seeing you before in my life. Are you another hopped up fan dying to be my friend, 'cause if you are you'll make me regret taking care of you when you passed out on my floor."

The boy smiled. "You could say that I am a fan, Matt, but not in the way you think. We were once good friends actually, though I see that you don't remember that part. I know the reason why to, but first things first. Reintroductions are in order. My name is Dean, and I'm…well, I guess you could say that I'm an author." Matt nodded skeptically.

"Right," he said. "You got anything else that you want to tell me? You haven't given me much reason to believe you. In fact, I doubt that's even your real name."

The boy laughed. "You know, that's precisely what you said the day we first met, about four years ago running. Not that it matters now of course, since you don't remember, but I'll fill you in on some key details of your life. I know that your parents are divorced, and I know that you have a little brother named T.K., just like I know that your digimon partner is Gabumon, and that you once had a breakdown in the digital world and had a fight with your best friend Tai." Matt gasped.

_How could he know that? Not even Tai and I talk about what went down between us on that day._

The boy grinned. "You want me to go on, Matt? 'Cause I'm on a role. I remember how you left the Digi-destined to 'find' yourself again, and how you destroyed Puppetmon, and how later on you rescued Sora from a darkness that nearly enveloped you, and how later you helped Tai and Wargreymon against the last Dark Master, Peidmon. 'Course, your friendship with him had to rejuvenate the two first since Peidmon had already taken it into his own hands to pummel them while you were gone…"

"All right!" Shouted Matt Ishida. "How do you know all this? This isn't exactly public knowledge you know."

The boy known as Dean, smiled again. "That's where you're wrong Matt. Your life _is _public knowledge, and has been for quite some time. You just don't remember. There is so much that you must know, but I can't decide just what to tell you. This isn't the sort of thing that you would tell just about anyone without risking…" The boy paused for a second and cursed before getting up off the couch. "I have to go Matt."

"Wha…? What do you mean? You're in no shape to go anywhere." Dean waved him off.

"That's where you're wrong. This is mostly superficial stuff. It'll be gone when I get back, so you don't have to worry…" he stopped again. "Hang on!" Dean suddenly shouted. "I'm coming!" He gave Matt an apologetic look.

"Dinner time," was all he said before he began to fade, as though he were the Cheshire Cat from 'Alice in Wonderland'.

"What's going on?!" Matt shouted, completely and totally taken off guard by this series of events.

"Sor…y…" were the last words that Dean spoke before he faded entirely. He tried to say something more, but they were lost in the eerie silence that filled the apartment. Matt seriously began to wonder if he had just lost his mind.

_I think that I need to speak to Tai about this, _he thought.

6


	10. Chapter 10

Disclaimer: I don't own Digimon. If I did, I probably wouldn't be writing this.

The Wages of Fans is Fiction: Chapter 10

Shinjuku Park, same day.

Rika Nonaka walked through the park wearing her school uniform, having just been let out from school. Under normal circumstances she wouldn't have been caught dead in the park wearing her uniform, but today was different. She had a faraway, dreamy look in her eyes, and wasn't really focusing on her normally all-important pride. She had someone to see today…

Rika stopped suddenly and frowned, and the scene paused. The generic people around her vanished and a boy just appeared out of thin air in front of her. He looked at her with worry in his eyes.

"All right, Rika, what's the matter this time?"

Rika sighed. "I don't think that I can do this."

"Of course you can. You've done this plenty of times before."

"Yeah, though usually I've had way better writers than this. What I've seen so far of the script sucks. You have misspellings by the truckload and you can't seem to tell a verb from a noun, never mind the fact that your onomatopoeia makes me want to cringe every time I read it."

"Hey," said the boy. "That's what this is all about. I want to get better at this after all…"

"Then you're going to be working at this for a very long time."

"Hey!"

"You know, I can't decide what's worse. The fact that your writing style is so crappy or that you're having me kiss a girl in this fic."

The boy chuckled nervously and sweat dropped. "Like I said, Rika, you've worked this angle before…"

"And as I said, I've done this with better writers, and even then I'll sometimes delegate through doubles. The main reason though that I don't think that I can do this, is because of what you have planned for me and Jeri by the second chapter."

"You said in your profile that you keep an open mind…"

"That was before I read _your _profile. First, you're a guy, and second, you're not even gay. This leads me to believe that you're just another little pervert with a sick…"

Suddenly a screen appeared next to them facing downwards, and before they could say anything else it dumped a troop of kids and digimon onto the dirt ground.

"Hey…WHOAH! YAAAAAAAAHHHHH!"

Thud!

There were quite an agreeable number of groans from the group as the screen winked out of existence and they began to recover. Rika looked them over and realized that she recognized some of them. Assuming an annoyed stance, Rika glared at them, tapping her foot impatiently on the ground.

"Ryan? Just what do you think that you're doing here? I thought that we weren't working again until my schedule was free."

As the author watched with bewildered eyes, a boy with brown hair and dark green eyes looked up at the sound of Rika's voice and groaned in exasperation.

"Oh, you have _got _to be kidding me. Of all the people that we run into on an emergency trip to Shinjuku it's gotta be the self-proclaimed _Digimon Queen_. You know, I'd almost rather be back in Odaiba and face the Apocalypse again. At least I'd know death would be relatively painless by comparison."

"What's the matter?" Asked Rika, raising an eyebrow. "Not happy to see me?"

Ryan and the others picked themselves up from off the ground. "Yeah," began Ryan sarcastically. "You're balm for my tired eyes."

"Excuse me," said the boy next to Rika. "I don't know who you are, but ms. Nonaka here is on a busy schedule. Can you please find time to socialize later?"

"No," said Rika.

"Wha…?"

"I said no. I'm leaving. If you want to continue with this fic, either you find someone else to live out your sick fantasy or you hire my double. I've got better things to do."

"What?! I can't hire your double! Ruki broke my nose the last time she did any work for me!"

"Then I guess you're looking for someone else. Why don't you get one of those Mary Sue's to do this?"

"Rika?" Asked Chris. "Who's this?"

The boy looked at Chris with a startled expression on his face.

"_I _am an author, kid. I'm called _Dichotomy of the Heart_, and I'll have you know that Rika and I were in the middle of something important here…"

"Not anymore," said Rika as she walked away from him. "I'm sure that whatever these losers are up to is bound to be way more interesting than continuing with your fic."

"You can't just up and quit! You have to have a really good reason just to abandon a fic…"

Rika suddenly grabbed Ryan by his shirt and began shaking him like a rabbit. "Tell me that you guys have a reason for being here, 'cause I don't want to have to listen to this guy's voice anymore today! I don't care what it is, just make it sound important!"

"Uh…well, we were just escaping a crisis situation that's recently developed in Odaiba…"

"Good enough. Let's go!" And with that Rika began to drag Ryan away from the group, with the others watching with bewildered looks on their faces.

"Wha…? Hey! Ow! Not the ear! Not the ear!" Ryan began complaining.

"Well, stop dragging your feet and _move_ you idiot! I don't have all day!"

Reno and Chris just shrugged and began following. William looked over at the author who had identified himself as Dichotomy of the Heart.

"Sorry," he apologized. "We didn't mean to interrupt your work. Really."

Dichotomy sighed. "No, it's okay. This story wasn't really working out so well anyway. Rika was just being a little too difficult for my tastes."

"What was your story about, anyway?"

Dichotomy smiled. "It was a tale of love. What more can a person ask for?"

William shrugged. Whatever it was, Rika hadn't seemed too happy with it, but he wasn't going to ask for details. "Well, if you ever do get finished with it, maybe you can send me a copy or something. I'd love to read it."

The boy brightened visibly. "Really?"

"What can I say?" Said William grinning. "I'm an old softie when it comes to romance. Anyway, I better catch up with the others, so I'll see you later."

As he left to catch up with the others, his partner Gaomon looked up at him. William noticed.

"What?"

Gaomon shook his head. "You really don't know what's going on do you?"

"Of course I don't know what's going on. Reno does though, and I'm interested in hearing what he's got to say…"

"I'm not talking about the incident back in Odaiba. I was referring to Dichotomy. I've read some of his work, and it's not…_quite_…what you think it is."

"What do you mean?"

Gaomon motioned for William to lean in closer and whispered his answer in his ear. A second later, William pulled back with a slightly surprised and thoughtful expression on his face.

"Now _that's _surprising."

"I don't know why you're so shocked over this revelation. These people have been around the FanFic domain for years."

"No," said William with a quiet laugh. "It's not that. I just never thought of you as the kind of mon who would read that stuff, Ed."

Gaomon began sputtering protests, and William laughed all the way along.

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Izzy and Mimi had just gotten the boy to their car and were in the process of getting him situated in the seat when a voice called out to them.

"IZZY! MIMI! HEY!"

Turning they found themselves staring at the figures of Kari and Davis walking towards them and…Izzy frowned. _Were they holding hands?_ Izzy blinked, hoping that he had just been imagining it. He wasn't.

"Um…hey?" Said Izzy cautiously.

"Izzy? Are they holding hands?" Asked Mimi bluntly. Davis and Kari gave the pair an odd look. Izzy couldn't help but feel grateful that Mimi had noticed it to. For some reason he felt as though Davis and Kari were supposed to have a different relationship, but memories came unbidden to him; memories from their battles against Ken when he had been the Digimon Emperor.

_Kari had twisted her ankle when Gatomon tackled her to the ground, just barely avoiding the Monochromon's Volcanic Strike attack. The Monochromon lunged at them, and neither one of them was in the position or condition to make a fast getaway. _

"Have courage!" _Tai shouted to Davis._

"Kari's in trouble,"_ said Davis as he got up, still holding the digi-egg with the crest of courage emblazoned on it. _"You want courage, I'll show you courage! DIGI-ARMOR _ENERGIZE!_" _The digi-egg glowed with an orange light, enveloping the short blue digimon called Veemon._

Izzy shook his head, trying to clear it. _Why am I remembering this? I wasn't there for that._ Yet here he was, and he knew that had been the day that Kari and Davis had become inseparable, much to Tai's dismay but he had given them his blessings anyway. But there was something so, very, wrong about all this.

"Are you guys okay?" Asked Davis. Before Mimi could say anything in response to this, Izzy jumped in.

"Yes. Of course, though we were just involved in a fight with…well, I don't really know what. I think that we need to call the other Digi-destined though and have a discussion about this. But first we could use your help. This kid here," Izzy indicated the boy that he and Mimi had been packing into the backseat. "Was involved in the battle, and whether you believe it or not, I think that he turned into a digimon."

"What? No way!" Exclaimed Davis. Kari looked at Izzy skeptically.

"Izzy, are you sure?" She asked.

Izzy nodded. "Sure I'm sure. I suspect that he's at the center of whatever's going on this time, so we'll need your guy's help in getting him to our apartment and getting a hold of the others."

"Well, all right then!" Said Davis as his closed fist shot up towards the sky. "You can count me in!"

"Davis…" said Kari.

Mimi looked back and forth between the two, unable to shake the feeling that something was wrong here.

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Reno took a look over Rika Nonaka's front yard, and found that he was able to say that he found it quite beautiful. It had a sense of peacefulness that he didn't think existed in the world, and he envied the girl for that. Sighing and shaking his head, Reno turned away from the scene. He didn't feel that this was the time for such sentimentalities; he had to steel himself for what he had to tell the others. Spying Ryan, Reno made his way over to him.

"Hey, what's up?"

Ryan looked at him and shrugged.

"I see," said Reno. "Are the other Tamers coming?"

"Tough to say," said Ryan. "All the other characters are stuck in one line of fiction or another, so we may not get to see all of them. There's a chance that Takato might make it, but he's currently involved in a story that has him getting run over by a car, and Henry's currently lost in another dimension with no other company except for Terriermon and his mouth."

"Ouch. Sucks to be him. Anyone else?"

"I just heard Rika yelling at Ryo over the phone so it's up in the air right now. Guess we'll know in a few minutes."

"I see," he said again. They were silent for a minute.

"I'm curious," said Ryan, breaking the silence. "Why is it that in just about every Tamer fic the heroes of the story always end up at Rika's house?"

"What do you mean?"

"Well, it just seems like whenever there's a Tamer meeting or the main hero gets knocked around a little too hard or something like that, somehow they always end up here. It's almost like it's a tradition or something."

Reno chuckled. "I don't know, but I think that the majority of stories that have that occurrence tend to be fixated on Rika and her relationships. And as for Tamer meetings happening here, it just makes more sense. We saw very little of Jeri's house in the series, and Takato's is a little small being a combination home and shop, and as for Henry well, his home is a little crowded. As for Kazu, Kenta, and Ryo, we never once saw their homes, except I think for Kazu. Heck, I'm not even sure if Ryo lives in the same city. It's best to go for what's already familiar when it comes to fan fiction. It cuts down time on writing and description. If everyone already knows what to expect, then you don't have to waste to much time and you can get to the meat of the story quickly."

"I guess you're right," said Ryan, though now he looked as though something else was troubling him.

"Is that all?" Asked Reno. Ryan looked over at him.

"No. What you said about stories focusing on relationships made me think of something. Before you saved us from Digidestined of Darkness, we fought a Black Wargreymon and were rescued by an author, at least that's what the digivice said, named Dean. When he attacked Black Wargreymon he shouted something about Matt and Sora forever."

"Your point?"

"Well, it just occurred to me that maybe it was a bad idea coming here. I mean, for whatever reasons that the authors are coming to Odaiba, they seem pretty fixated on couplings and settling old scores, and seeing as how we learned that Tai and Sora are getting married," Reno jerked at this.

"What? Tai and Sora are getting _married_?!"

"Dude, let me finish. As I was saying, we learned that Tai and Sora were getting married, and Tai didn't seem to know us at all despite the fact that Tai had called and asked to see me by name. And then William mentioned something about preferring Matt over Tai when it came to a coupling and Tai went ballistic. We first attributed this to a double but since the author's started showing up, I've been thinking…"

"Sounds dangerous," chuckled Reno trying to get a hold of himself from Ryan's little bombshell.

"Seriously, dude. Hear me out. We have a crisis on our hands here."

"Sorry."

"I'm just wondering, if it's an author that has changed things back in Odaiba, how long would it be before he or she sets his sights on Shinjuku? We might want to avoid the Tamers all together if that happens. I have a feeling that things could get bloody here in one hell of a hurry."

Reno thought about this for a second, and suddenly realized what Ryan was getting at. "You're worried about the whole Rukato, Jurato, Ryuki thing aren't you?"

"Dude, have you read the reviews for those stories, or for that matter read the stories? If we hook up with Ryo I don't think the Rukato supporters will stop at anything to knock us off in addition to him. I can't even begin to count the number of stories that have featured Ryo getting killed, committing suicide, getting kicked in the balls, or acting like a stuck-up jerk. I haven't read any of the Ryuki or Jurato fics, but I'm willing to bet that those authors are just as passionate about their beliefs as the Rukato ones. And if any of them are going to be like what we've faced so far, I think that we're going to be in trouble."

Reno thought it over. Ryan _did _have a point there. "Well, there are some honorable authors out there who might pitch in to help if things do get rowdy, but I don't think that we have anything to worry about."

"How come you're so sure?"

"I've read some of the stuff of the author who's behind all this. He sticks strictly with season 01 and 02."

"I see," said Ryan. "Still, I don't think that we should depend on season preference alone."

"Why are you so worried about the whole Rukato, Ryuki thing? I can understand Ryuki, but isn't your author a Rukato supporter?"

"Didn't I just get done saying that if we end up backing Ryo we'll end up being a target? Some of those guys do _not _like Ryo at all, and if there's anything that scares me more than a rampaging digimon like Black Wargreymon, it's a zealot. I am very afraid of zealots. They sometimes have that look in their eyes that makes me think that I'll get burned just by talking to them."

"Take it easy Ryan, if worst comes to worst, we can always depend on Ryo lovers to protect us."

"That's a lovely piece of irony. Ryuki supporters having to protect the characters of a Rukato supporter _from _Rukato supporters."

"See? You're already looking at the bright side of things. But like I said, I don't think that we have to worry about that. The lives of this season are still undecided and probably will never be. I imagine that it will make it a little bit harder to change things."

"How would it be harder than something that's already set in stone?"

"Because when something's undecided it has a constantly shifting nature, it becomes difficult to tack it down. When something's already decided it becomes stuck and doesn't really go anywhere else."

Ryan looked at Reno. "You know, I don't think that made a whole lot of sense. In fact, I'd swear that would be the sort of thing that a fan fic writer would come up with just to provide an explanation for that line of reasoning…"

"Just trust me on this, all right? I once did a report for school on how authors of history change the past even though you're not supposed to be able to change what happened. But it is easy to change what people already _know _about it. It's that way with season's one and two. Everyone knows what happened, but not everyone is willing to accept that, so they change it around. And if someone is good enough and sneaky enough, they can change what everyone knows about it, from beginning to end. With season's three and four, the creators didn't really finish things up like they did with the original Digi-destined, so they left things hanging. That's why it will be hard to change what people already know about them."

"That still doesn't make sense," said Ryan. Reno sighed.

"Fine, I give up. I think I could probably explain this to Guilmon and expect him to understand better than you…"

"Hey!"

The door to Rika's house slid open and out stormed a fuming Rika. Ryan and Reno both blinked.

"Um…is everything all right?"

"No one else is able to make it," was all Rika said.

"Oh. Well, in that case we might as well just collect Chris and the others and get going…"

"I'm coming to!"

"What?" Exclaimed Ryan and Reno's eyes just bugged out of his head.

"Hey, I'm bored out of my skull, and I want to know what the deal is around here. And I'm _not _going back to that poor excuse for an author just to kill time between fics. So unless you've got a problem with that…!"

"Okay! Okay!" Ryan said raising his hands in a warding gesture. "Take it easy, will ya?" He looked over at Reno. "Jeez, forget about the authors. Rika will probably kill us long before we get to the bottom of this." Reno didn't say a word. He just looked up at the sky and started whistling while Rika glared at Ryan.

Chris appeared at the doorway. "Hey guys! You seriously got to try this food that Rika's grandmother made. It's awso…" He stopped suddenly as Ryan and Reno both shoved their way past him, knocking him to the floor. Looking after their retreating forms, Chris wondered just what had gotten into them. Then he looked at the look on Rika's face and got a pretty good idea as to what happened. Chris sweat dropped as he got up and slowly backed away from the red-haired girl.

_Heh Heh. Okay, no sudden movements Chris…_Rika cocked her head at him and _hmmphed _before walking past him towards the kitchen. Satisfied that death wasn't going to be his lot today, Chris breathed a sigh of relief and followed, wondering just what it was that set her off _this _time.

_I'll probably find out when I get a last confession out of Ryan or something, provided that Rika lets him breathe long enough for that._ As he entered the kitchen Reno told the others to gather around the table and listen to what he had to tell them, as it concerned what happened in Odaiba.

_This should be interesting,_ thought Chris.

16


	11. Chapter 11

A/N: I'd like to thank both Dag 417 and Gigawolf1 for lending me the use of their characters, Reno and John. They're making things much easier with the story telling (and a lot more fun). Thanks you guys!

Disclaimer: I don't own digimon, and neither does anyone else on this site.

The Wages of Fans is Fiction: Chapter 11

In the beginning there was the word, and then there was light. Well, light created by the opening of a Microsoft Word program and the first words to a story laid down. For this fic, it was a pretty typical opening; the beginning of a brand new day with the kids going to school and getting ready to learn new things, hang out with old friends, or make new friends. For a group of kids featured in this story, their lives were different from the average child. Perhaps being friends and partners with digital life forms had something to do with it. Or maybe it was because they entered a strange world where those life forms were from on a regular basis to knock down large spire shaped objects, or knock down other digital life forms in general. Their lives are fraught with danger, far more than children their age should ever expect to encounter, and from beings who have the habit of trying to destroy the world, or at least a city.

What's that old Chinese curse? May you live in interesting times?

_It is just fiction_, thought the boy who sat at his computer, trying to think of what to write. Of course, this was true only to an extent. When a writer sat down to do some serious creativity, they entered a world of their own making, which in the case of fan fiction bore a remarkable resemblance to a world that either they read about or saw on TV. There were times that this world could actually assume its own reality, entrapping the author in its embrace and they become its willing prisoner.

_Isn't it?_ For this child, ever since he met up with a digimon named Tapirmon, he hadn't been sure of what reality really was anymore. But, for the sake of his own sanity, he decided to go with it and hope no one noticed. It might even be fun in the long run, but that wasn't his main concern at this moment.

The boy, whose name is John, sat back and groaned. Oh, how he _hated_ writer's block. He had a story that he wanted to write, but couldn't quite figure out how to express it. Sighing, John clicked on the Internet icon and accessed the FanFic Domain website, and began scrolling through the various stories that were up, hoping that at least one of them could provide him with some inspiration.

_Boy, there seem to be an awful lot of season three, four, and five stories today,_ John thought as he looked over the stories. Not that he minded of course, he liked those stories, especially the Tamer fics (he had modeled his author avatar after a Tamer when he first logged on), but today he wanted to try something different. Looking around he noticed that there was an apparent lack of stories centering on the first two seasons of Digimon. In fact, there weren't that many pages on Digimon stories anymore. What used to be around a thousand had now been cut to a little over three hundred. It was as if the network administrators had decided on doing a wholesale cleansing of fan fiction all in one shot. Checking his updates, John found that there was nothing to suggest that this is what happened, so he did a search for Digimon Adventure fics. He found only one. Clicking on it, he began reading through it, his eyes skimming over the lines of Tai and Sora getting married, Tai's encounter with some strange kids, and Matt getting slapped by a girl because he happened to say the wrong name when he kissed her. John made a _tsking _noise and read onwards. _Couples,_ he thought. It seemed to be all that these authors thought about. Sure, there were a few good ones that didn't focus so heavily on that aspect, and even fics that focused on OC characters as well, but it almost seemed as if everyone was in a war over their preferences concerning who they thought would go well together. Sure, romance was always good, but it didn't make the totality of a story. And with everybody else working that angle, John had done his best to avoid the coupling conflicts, so he relegated himself to simply writing stories just for the sake of the tale that he wanted to tell and he was always happy to read a fic that did the same as well. Despite his philosophy, John did have his own preferences, but he mostly kept them to himself and did not allow them to influence his work in any way.

As John read past the sudden and inexplicable appearance of Black Wargreymon and his attack on those children who had met Tai, John couldn't help at scoff at the story. There were just so many holes in this fic, and there didn't seem to be a plot that he could follow. There didn't seem to be a reason for Black Wargreymon to appear other than to destroy those kids, and where was Tai in all this? And what was this talk that the strange kids had about TV shows and whatnot? This wasn't usual fan fiction, and there were no perspectives that he could find that could help him explain what was going on. John gave a frustrated huff and hit the _back _icon on his web browser.

_This story's a piece of crap,_ he thought. _Guess I'll just have to come up with my fic on my own._ He set his hands on the key board and began typing, not really thinking about what he was doing, but was willing to write some words and see where they took him. As soon as he typed the name _Kari_ on the first page however, the name was deleted.

"What the…?" Said John, suddenly confused. Over on his bed, his friend and partner, Tapirmon looked up and cocked an eyebrow. As John watched in horror, the deletion of his story, all three hundred words so far, disappeared and Microsoft word closed down. In it's place was the story that he had just backed out of, and against his will he found his gaze trapped in its sentences, reading over each word until he finally came to the most recent addition where Kari and Davis met up with Mimi and Izzy, _holding hands_!

John's right eye twitched and Tapirmon floated over, wondering what was up.

Everyone has their own preferences, even if they choose to stay out of conflicts as famous as the coupling battles in the Digimon branch of the FanFic Domain. Despite John's philosophy, he always found himself strangely getting upset whenever he came across a story that involved Davis and Kari romantically, and something that was perhaps deeper than instinct told him what he had to do. He had to travel to the FanFic Domain personally and see what was up. He didn't know why he knew this, but he was sure it was related to why he couldn't write his story the way he wanted it to be written. He scanned one of the lines from this strange and alien piece of work.

"_The famous Digi-destined Izzy and Mimi. I see that my master has made a good choice when it came to you two. I always thought that you contrasted each other well."_

It was that last line that did it for him. _"I always thought that you contrasted each other well."_ All the pieces seemed to fit together now. Someone, somehow, was making his story the dominant one, and all the others were disappearing one by one.

_How long before the other ones start to become affected?_ John had no idea. He didn't even know how long this had been going on, if it just started today or last week! All he knew was that he had to do something about it. His eyes were drawn up to the part where Black Wargreymon attacked those three kids and their partner digimon outside of Tai's apartment. They were the key, he was sure of it. But how was he going to find them? Okay, he had their names from their conversation with Tai, but he had never heard of them before. _OC's?_ That was a possibility, but John had a hard time believing that he would have an easy time tracking down OC's. There were quite a number of them, but they didn't always get a whole of reviewers in their stories unless they were featured side by side with canon characters, and even then it sometimes took some time for readers to get used to them. And not all OC's were looked at favorably.

Looking back at the line that involved Davis and Kari holding hands, John grabbed his D-Arc and looked at his partner, who realized what was going on. From the look in John's eyes, a line that shouldn't have been crossed had been, and that was just plain _unforgivable_. Holding his D-Arc in front of the computer screen, John and Tapirmon disappeared in a flash of light as they began their journey to the FanFic Domain, determined to rain fire and brimstone on whoever it was that had not only prevented him from being able to write his own story, but also had the gall to make his or her own desires stand for everyone else's. And so passed an age-old saying through his mind that seemed to describe perfectly what he intended to do once he arrived at his destination.

_Of course you realize, this means war._

_-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------_

Tai picked up the phone as it rang. "Hello?" He asked casually. A highly irratic and excitable voice that he recognized all to well answered him and began rattling off what sounded like a calamity greater than all the Dark Masters put together. "Wha…? Mimi! Is everything all right? Hey! Slow down, will you? I'm only getting one in every four words that you're saying! What's this? A kid? Beat up a digimon? Single handedly? The digimon is also a kid? That doesn't make sense Mimi! Is Izzy there? He is? Put him on the phone! What do you mean that he's busy? A meeting?" Sora came over to him with a questioning look in her eyes.

"Okay, you and Izzy are setting up a meeting at your place. All right. Uh-huh. We'll be there. Okay. Right. See you then." Tai hung up the phone.

"What was that about?" Asked Sora.

"Mimi's having another one of her spaz attacks. She was saying something about a digimon being attacked at the mall by a kid…"

"A kid? Are you sure?"

"I'm just the messenger, so I only know what she told me. Right now Izzy and Mimi have another kid at their apartment and if I heard Mimi right he had transformed into a digimon. Izzy and Mimi are both trying to get a hold of the other Digi-destined, and Kari and Davis are there right now helping out with their D-terminals."

"A kid turning into a digimon. This is something that I have to see. Do you think that this is important Tai?"

Tai shrugged. "I don't know. It might be some new evil from the digital world, so I definitely think that it's worth checking out. At the very least we should hear the whole story and not the abridged version that I got from Mimi."

Sora nodded. "I'll get my coat," she said and headed for the coat wrack. She stopped and frowned as she looked down the hall. She turned back to her fiancé.

"Tai? What happened to our door?"

Wondering what she was talking about, Tai took a look and was flabbergasted to see the door to his apartment lying on the floor with a large crack in its middle.

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Mimi set the phone down and walked over to where Izzy sat watching over the boy that they had brought in and wrapped her arms around him. "Everything all right?" She asked softly.

"I don't know, Mimi," Izzy said quietly. "A lot of strange things have been going on lately. There was something that the other kid at the mall said that got to me, something about how he was glad that his master 'made the right decision about us'. I don't like the sound of that."

"And you think that our guest will be able to make sense out of that?"

Izzy clasped a hand over one of her own. "I hope so Mimi. I hope so."

They stood in silence for a few moments.

"Izzy?" Asked Mimi quietly. "Did you feel something weird when we saw Davis and Kari together?" Izzy breathed a sigh of relief.

"Glad I'm not the only one whose noticed it. And here I thought that I was losing my mind."

Mimi giggled. "If so, then we both are. Maybe we should ask them about it."

"Maybe, but I don't know why that I feel this way. They've been together for a while now, ever since Davis first became a Digi-destined."

Mimi had no answers for Izzy, but she gave him a comforting squeeze, hoping to ease some of his uneasiness. Izzy did likewise before turning around and kissing her.

The world seemed to stand still for a moment as the two lovers embraced.

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Matt had been walking down to Tai's apartment with Gabumon, trying to come to terms with what had just happened to him when his cell phone rang.

"Yeah, hello?" A pause. "TK? What's up, little bro? Izzy's having a meeting at his place?" Matt felt as though someone had just punched him in the gut. He had wanted to see Tai, and hopefully catch him alone so that they could talk, but apparently it was not meant to be. Oh well, if Tai was able to make it, then he'd just talk to him afterwards. Until then, duty called.

"Yeah, sure. I'll be there. Yeah, I'm all right. I'll be there as soon as I can. Bye." Matt hung up and looked down at Gabumon. "There's been a change of plans."

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Black Wargreymon stood on top of a building, reaching out with his senses. After his humiliating battle with that strange entity, he had been searching for a way to redeem himself in the eyes of his master, and the only way that he could see himself doing that was by completing the task that had been given to him. By destroying those children.

Only the problem was, they weren't in Odaiba anymore.

As a warrior, he had a pretty good ability to track down his opponents, no matter where they ran or how well they hid. This time though, events were making it rather difficult to do just that. There were too many portals opening for him to get a solid lead on his prey, but he was persistent. He deepened his focus and searched.

There!

Taking off, Black Wargreymon headed to the direction where a web link had sent his allusive adversaries.

He headed for Shinjuku.


	12. Chapter 12

Disclaimer: Must I write this 'till my fingers bleed and my brain explodes? Fine! I do not own Digimon! You happy?

The Wages of Fans is Fiction: Chapter 12

The world was dark at first, but slowly, ever so slowly, it came back to view. Images swam and sparkled, and nothing seemed to make sense until finally things snapped into crystal clarity. With a groan, Koji got up from where he lay and looked about him in confusion. He was sitting on a bed in what looked like an apartment. Wondering just where he was, he checked about his person, and made a disgusted sound when he learned that both his bandana and his D-Tector were missing. The bandana wasn't a problem though (especially since he found it lying on the nightstand next to him) but the D-Tector? That was a completely different story. Getting up and grabbing his bandana Koji went towards the door, putting his ear to it first to listen before he slowly opened it. Cautiously Koji slipped out of the bedroom and made his way around the corner of the hall and into the living room where he stopped, his mouth falling open in shock. Before Koji's eyes stood two people, both young adults by the look of things. One was a girl with light, almost blonde hair, a pink t-shirt, and a mini-skirt. The other was a boy wearing a red T-shirt with thin black stripes and a green jacket. His hair was slightly spiky and a deep, dark red that was almost a brown. They looked familiar to Koji, but he couldn't really tell from this angle, as they were both embraced in a passionate kiss. They soon broke apart, giving Koji a clear field of vision of the female, and a memory sparked.

"Mimi!"

The couple turned in Koji's direction, startled by the sound of his voice, and they soon set their eyes on him. Both Mimi and Izzy raised an eyebrow.

"Oh, you're awake," said Izzy, while Mimi frowned at the boy. "Good, we have some questions that we need to ask you."

"Yeah," said Mimi. "Like how you happen to know our names for starters."

Koji blinked, and then narrowed his eyes. "What do you mean by _know your names_? What kind of question is that? Of course I'm supposed to know your names, we've worked together before."

Izzy and Mimi were exchanging glances when Davis and Kari entered the room.

"Okay, Izzy," said Davis. "TP says that the others are on their way so…hey! That kid's awake!"

Koji looked at them. "Kari?" He asked the bearer of the crest of light. "What's going on here? Izzy and Mimi act as if they didn't know me…"

"We don't know you," said Mimi a little loudly. "Though how you know us is certainly something that I would like to know."

"Maybe he's from the future," said Davis.

"That's ridiculous," said Mimi.

"Hang on," said Izzy. "Let's not be to hasty here. He does obviously know us, even though we've never seen him before…"

"Hang on," said Koji. "First of all, you guys _do _know me. We've known each other for years, and you guys look exactly the way you did when I got attacked. All I know is, I heard that there was some trouble in Odaiba while I was working with an author on a piece of fan fiction so I came to investigate…"

"Fan fiction?" Laughed Mimi. "Just what are you talking about?"

Koji looked confused. "What am I talking about? I'm talking about the lives that we've been leading ever since each of our series has ended…"

"Series?" Asked Davis, confused at first before his face broke into a grin. "You mean like on TV?"

"Davis…" began Kari.

"What? I'm serious. Hey! Do you think that I look good on TV?"

"Davis, I think you look good on anything, but I don't think that's the point right now…"

Koji clutched the sides of his head before looking at Davis and Kari. "What's going on here, Kamiya? I thought you were with TK?"

The Digi-destined of light looked at Koji with a confused look. "TK? Me with TK? What are you talking about? Why would I be with TK?"

Koji just looked at the girl as though she had just slapped him.

Izzy, who had been watching and listening carefully, suddenly had a thought occur to him. "Uh…Davis? Kari? Why don't you go make sure that we have some snacks ready for when the others come? Mimi, why don't you help them? I need to ask…what's your name?"

Koji frowned. "I don't know what your game is, Izzy…"

"Just humor me okay?"

"Fine. I'm Koji."

"Good to meet you Koji…again, I guess. Now, there are some things that I need to ask you in private…"

"Izzy?" Asked Mimi. "Why do you need to ask him in private? I'm sure that Davis and Kari can handle the…"

"I'm sorry Mimi, but it involves a lot of technical stuff that you might not understand. I'll tell you later, okay?"

Mimi narrowed her eyes. There was something that Izzy was keeping from her, she was sure of it. "Promise?" She asked.

Izzy's eyes softened as he looked at his love. "Yeah, I promise." He meant it to, but he worried about how she might take…whatever it was that he found out. He wasn't to sure himself what he was looking for, but something that Koji said about fan fiction had sparked something deep inside of him that was almost like a memory. He needed to do some deep digging in order to find out what it was.

Grabbing Koji by the shoulders, Izzy steered him in the direction of his computer room, while Mimi watched with her mind full of confusion and worry.

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He was worried as he finished typing that last sentence. He wasn't sure what it was that Izzy had discovered (having focused so much on Tai for the majority of this story), but by the sounds of the conversation that Tai had with Mimi, one of the Frontier children had made their way to Odaiba. If that was so, than it was imperative that he step up his conquest of the series so that everyone's memories were altered. 01 and 02 were easy because they were the one's that he was most familiar with. He knew the personalities of the characters inside and out, but as for the other seasons he did not know them that well at all. Oh, sure, he had watched them, but he had never developed an interest in them, especially since not much else was done with them beyond just their one season with the exception of movies.

And that was where the difficulty lay, his lack of interest, his unfamiliarity with the respective seasons, and the fact that their fate concerning the future was undecided. He could do it, but it would take time, more than he could spare, especially with those OC's out there mucking up the works. He wasn't sure how, but apparently their very presence was what was causing the disruptions in his story, causing the characters to revert or show signs of remembering their previous lives, and as a result he was starting to lose control. The boy had hoped that by employing the other authors that were sympathetic to his cause he could eliminate the OC's and continue with his own version of Digimon, regardless of the promises that he made to his allies, but other authors had shown up also, and an all out war was brewing amongst them. Nothing too grand had happened yet, or else the characters would have noticed, but it was brewing. It was only a matter of time before things _exploded_.

He had to find the OC's. Not just the three that he had encountered, but _all _of them and destroy them one by one. Once they were gone, no one would be able to change what he had made for himself and things could finally be how he wanted them to be. The way they _should_ be. But where to start?

His attention suddenly fixated on the Black Wargreymon that he had conjured up to fight those first three OC's. The mega was on the move, and was doing so at a rapid pace towards the area of Shinjuku. He must have found something. Those OC's? If so, all for the better then, except that if Black Wargreymon went to Shinjuku, the home of the third season of Digimon, then he might not be able to help him. His powers were weakened outside his preferred seasons, but if those OC's that had eluded him earlier had escaped him to there, then he must destroy them whatever the cost!

Focusing all his attention on Black Wargreymon, the boy began typing.

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Matt and Gabumon had just turned the corner when they spied Tai, Sora, Biyomon, and Agumon. Calling out to them Matt sped up his pace so as to join them. Sora offered Matt a small, friendly smile, but there was something about Tai in his facial expression that made him seem…distant. This made Matt a little nervous.

"Hey guys," Matt said. "Are you off to Izzy's little get-together too?"

"Yeah," said Sora. "According to Tai here, he and Mimi found a boy who could turn into a digimon."

"What?" Exclaimed Matt.

"Are you serious?" Asked Gabumon.

Tai frowned. "Well, that's what Mimi said over the phone," Tai said a little coldly. "She could have been mistaken. You know how she is."

Matt nodded. "Maybe she just got a little confused or something."

"I don't know guys," said Sora. "The digital world is capable of doing a lot of strange things. We can't just disregard it just because a friend of ours acts a little strange from time to time."

"You're right, Sora," said Matt. Tai looked at him with a strange look on his face that was almost…anger? Matt didn't notice. "We should hear what Izzy has to say about it first before jumping to conclusions."

"All right. Let's hurry along guys."

"Hang on Sora," said Tai. "Why don't you take Biyomon, Gabumon, and Agumon ahead. I've got to ask Matt something. Don't worry, we'll catch up."

Sora looked at Tai a little funny, but she decided not to question her fiancés motives. After all, it was probably guy talk, and Tai probably wanted to be the one to break the news to Matt about their engagement.

"All right," she said, grinning. "Just don't take forever."

'We won't." They waited until she was a fair distance away before saying anything.

"So, what'd you want to talk to me about?" Asked Matt.

"I have a question. Did you meet any kids with digimon recently? Especially kids by the names of Ryan, Chris, and…" Tai stopped, and thought about it for a second. "William?"

Matt cocked an eyebrow at this. "No, I haven't met any kids by those names. You said that they had digimon? What'd they look like?"

Tai shook his head. "It's not important."

"What's this about Tai?"

"Never mind. I'm sorry for bothering you about this," said Tai, feeling foolish for even asking. He had seen the honest puzzlement in his friend's eyes. Now he felt more than a little bit stupid for all those jealous feelings that he had earlier.

"Uh, sure, no problem," said Matt. "Look, if you want to talk about it…?"

"No, never mind. It's not important. They just seemed to know who you were and I thought that maybe they were fans of yours or something." _Even though they did say some pretty strange things,_ thought Tai.

"Oh. Okay. Anything else?"

Tai grinned. "Yeah. I also wanted to tell you that Sora and I are getting married. Isn't that awesome?"

"Yeah. Sure," said Matt as he forced a smile on his face, not really understanding why he felt saddened by this news.

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At the edge of Odaiba, a strange, dark figure with the appearance of a lion's mane and a staff and shield in his hands leapt onto a rooftop. _Koji where are you?_ It thought before it leapt back into the air again.

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Black Wargreymon soared through the air, intent on fulfilling his master's wishes. They were close, so very close now. He could almost smell them; hear the pounding of their hearts. Soon the blood that those hearts pounded would stain the ground and he…Black Wargreymon halted in the air as he felt a sudden surge of energy race into his body. His mind became blank and he knew no more.

The author had decided that this was the time to take a personal hand in things when he felt the appearance of a Log In gate. If an author was in town, especially an author in an area that he had not yet taken an official stance on yet, than he needed to be ready for anything. Using Black Wargreymon's enhanced senses and vision he spied the portal and gasped as a figure made its appearance. No, two figures! Narrowing his eyes he saw a Tapirmon with what looked like a human. _This can't be,_ he though. _I sense the aura of an author around this one so why…?_ It hit him. This one was both an author _and _a character. Self-Insertion! Ooooh…how this one despised that sort of thing. This was even worse than the effect that OC's caused. Where OC's were like a minor distortion in the fabric of the FanFic Domain's space-time continuum, Self-inserted authors/characters were like Black Holes by comparison. If he didn't get rid of this one, and fast this season and perhaps all others could be beyond his reach! If he could identify this character, he could lock him out of his account, thus denying him his author abilities and negating the affect of his presence. But first things first; he had to try and eliminate the author. And if the battle drew in the OC's that he was pursuing? So much the better.

Gathering negative energy between his hands, _Black Wargreymon_ raised it above his head and hurled it towards his soon-to-be-adversary.

"TERRA DESTROYER!" He shouted.

10


	13. Chapter 13

Disclaimer: How many different ways can I put this? I – _don't _– own Digimon.

The Wages of Fans is Fiction: Chapter 13

"Before we go any further I believe that we need to bring Rika up to speed. It's best that she knows precisely what it is that she's getting into," said Reno. He looked at Rika, as though he were expecting some kind of comment. She just simply looked back and nodded, indicating that it was all right for him to continue.

"I have reason to believe that something has happened to the fabric of the fan fic reality…"

"We kind of figured on that," said William. "Getting attacked by a Black Wargreymon outside of Tai's apartment has a way of driving that point home…"

Rika looked at William. "You guys were attacked by a Black Wargreymon?"

"Yeah."

"And you lived?"

"Why is that so hard to believe?" William asked. "Just because we're not Digi-destined or Tamers…"

"I thought that your author put a lock on your digivices so that you couldn't spoil anything from the story while you were going about with your daily lives."

"He did. We just happened to get saved by an author named Dean."

"An author?" Asked Rika, perplexed.

"Dean?" Asked Reno.

"Yes, and yes," said Caramon in response to both questions. "We even have the data to prove it. Chris?" Chris pulled out his digivice and called up an image of the entity that saved them. Rika and Reno both nodded.

"Huh," said Rika. "That's pretty weird. I would've thought that the Domain authorities would've gotten involved…"

"They're currently down," said Reno calmly. "Though I'm surprised that Dean has decided to involve himself personally in this, but then maybe the situation was worse than he had guessed."

Ryan looked at Reno. "You say that as if you knew him."

Reno nodded. "I do," he said. "He was the one who contacted me and asked me to check in on the situation. I was between fics at the time so I agreed."

"Hmmm. Weird." Reno raised an eyebrow.

"Why do you say that?"

"Oh. No reason I suppose. I'm just curious as to why he'd ask you and not someone else. Did he create you?"

"No."

"Oh." There seemed to be an uncomfortable silence in the room for a second, but only for a second.

"So why'd that Black Wargreymon attack you guys?" Asked Rika.

"I don't know. It happened shortly after we talked to Tai and Ryan got his hand caught in the door," said William smiling. Rika raised an eyebrow and looked at Ryan smirking slightly. Ryan growled at both of them.

"Can we _please_ focus on the task at hand?" said Reno exasperatedly. Caramon and William snickered at Reno's bad pun, but quickly suppressed it. "Anyway, you were saying something about Black Wargreymon attacking you. Is this when Dean stepped in?"

Chris nodded. "Yeah, but we didn't stick around long enough to see what the outcome would be. He wanted us out of there, and then attacked Black Wargreymon and shouting a battle cry that went something along the lines of _Sorato Forever_. Which reminds me, that was what seemed to start that whole chain of events."

"Why do you say that?" Asked Reno.

" 'Cause William made a comment about it in front of Tai when he told us that he and Sora were getting married."

"Hold on," said Rika. "I thought that Sora and Matt were married."

"That's kind of the reason why I made that comment," said William. "In fact, there was something really weird about the way Tai was acting towards us. You see, the reason why we went down to his place today was because he wanted to talk to Ryan…"

"Yeah. And you guys invited yourselves along for the ride," said Ryan. William just ignored him.

"…But when we got there, he acted as if he didn't know us at all, and he got pretty mad after I made that comment about Matt and Sora getting married. At first I thought that maybe it was just one of those doubles that occasionally get hired to fill in a characters shoes when they're too busy, but during the fight I saw what looked like the work of an author working his will on the area."

"Fog?" Reno asked. William nodded.

Rika was confused. "What's fog got to do with anything?"

"I would've thought that you knew, Rika," said Reno. "Authors can set up a special fog like barrier kind of like a digital field that separates a fic from the outside world. It's invisible to anyone inside the fog barriers boundary as long as they're a part of the story that the barriers set up for. It's a nifty little ability that was recently acquired and is now common practice. Keeps out uninvited visitors and ensures that everyone can use the same location without worrying about barging into another author's story. It's a great system."

"It's great until someone starts using it as a weapon to cut you off from the outside world. We had no way of getting help," said Ryan. "With the exception of Dean of course."

"Yes," said Reno. "Which brings me to the subject of Dean. Before he contacted me, he had noticed an unusual lack of fan fiction based on the first two seasons of Digimon, so he decided to investigate. When he found that one story seemed to be absorbing all the others and shutting authors out of their accounts he looked further. He contacted me with the idea of checking up on the characters because he wanted to see what such an occurrence might have on the characters."

"What did you find out?" Asked Chris.

"Nothing until I saw you guys actually. Dean didn't take into account that you guys might have had a meeting with the leader of the Digi-destined because you were fairly new to the game and unschooled in tactics. That and because of your aforementioned problem with the lock on your digivices."

"So why did he drop in to save us if you were in the area?"

Reno shrugged. "Dunno. I haven't been in contact with him since he hired me, so this is news to me. Maybe he decided to go after what he thought was the source himself or flush out the bad guy behind it. In either case, it didn't work."

Ryan thought for a minute. "Earlier you said that you knew who the author was that was behind all of this. Who is he? And can we get at him?"

"To answer your first question, he's called the _Lord of Fantasy_. I've read some of his fics, so I know that his knowledge of digimon is second to none, probably going above and beyond even Rika here." Rika snorted at that, but didn't say anything. "And in answer to your second question, no. He works behind the scenes so far, so that makes him immune to physical assault."

"So, do you have any plans as to how we might stop this new, evil plan?" Asked Rika sarcastically.

"Well…no." Reno admitted. Everyone face faulted.

"Terrific," said Ryan as he got back up. "Nice to know that we can go into an Armageddon on a wing and a prayer."

"You're being too much of a pessimist, Ryan," said Rika scowling.

"Ooh! Ooh!" Said Caramon. "This is usually the part of the show where one of the main characters makes an _all we have to do is believe in ourselves _speech."

"Caramon…" began Chris.

"Hey," said William to Rika with a serious look on his face. "Is this where you tell us that we're just going to _wing it_?"

Rika glared at him until he cringed. Looking away, Rika said, "Just my luck to be stuck here with a couple of comedians."

Reno frowned. "I thought that line was from episode 7, not 23."

Rika made an exasperated sound. _And here I didn't want to be famous like my mom. Life sure has a twisted sense of irony, _Rika thought.

"Anyway," said Reno. "I think that we should head to the main server of the FanFic Domain. I'm sure that we'll be able to get some answers there, and maybe, just maybe, we can find out why the network authorities haven't responded yet to stop _Lord's _story from assimilating the others, or preventing the other authors from battling in the streets with each other and the characters as you guys did when you met _Digidestined of Darkness_."

Rika looked at the three kids again. "Is there any sort of trouble that you guys _don't _attract?"

"Dunno," said Ryan. "We're in the process of making a list so we'll have to get back to you on that."

"Idiots," Rika muttered. Suddenly Rika sat up and said out loud, " 'Bout time that you got here, Renamon."

The Kitsune digimon known as Renamon phased into view. "My apologies, Rika. I was…delayed."

Rika smirked. "Yeah, I'll bet you were. Did you have fun?" Ryan and the others raised an eyebrow at this. Caramon smiled a wide, toothy smile as if he understood what was going on.

"Heh," he said. "I wonder if there's some truth to that little story after all."

Now all eyes were on him, and the ones that focused on him the most belonged to a yellow fox digimon and a red-haired girl, the former who had a great ability to be violent, and the latter renown for being violent. Caramon suddenly wished that he hadn't said anything.

Ryan and Reno decided not to pry, but Chris, true to his curious nature spoke up.

"What are you talking about?" He asked. "What story?"

"Nothing," said Caramon quickly. William however, suddenly caught on to what he was talking about, and one very broad grin graced his face.

"Oh, you mean that story from that _Who's Who in Fan Fics_ magazine, don't ya? Are you saying that stories true?"

"If it's all the same to you, I'd like to drop the subject now…" said Caramon, sweat dropping.

"Do you know what he's talking about?" Chris asked William. William nodded, still holding onto that insane grin of his.

"According to the article, Renamon has… dare I say it?...a boyfriend!"

Chris's eyes widened. "Seriously?"

Reno took a look at Renamon. She seemed to be a bit tense, and as for Rika…he shivered.

"Yeah," continued William. "And not only that, he's human."

"_WHAT_?" Shouted Ryan as he caught that last part. Reno put his face into his hands. Next to him, Dagmon huffed and decided now was as good a time as any to take a bathroom break in the front yard.

"Ryan?" Asked Richoemon. "What's going on? Why do Rika and Renamon look angry? Didn't you tell me once that having a boyfriend is a happy occasion for a girl?" Ryan ignored his partner and, after regaining his sense of rationality, tried to intervene.

"Uh, guys? I really don't think that this is the place to talk about this sort of thing…"

"Seriously?" Asked Chris. Caramon leapt off his partner's shoulder and ducked out of the kitchen. The countdown towards doom had begun.

"Seriously." William looked over at Renamon. "I never would have suspected. Heck, I didn't even believe the article when I read it. Sure, crossbreeding is talked about in fan fics, but I definitely didn't think that it…uh oh." William stopped as he realized suddenly what he had done. While Rika looked positively angry, Renamon had developed a kind of _icy _aura about her, one that signified doom and destruction for anyone who became its unwitting target.

Who was it that said _revenge is a dish best served cold_?

There was a quite thumping sound, and the room went quiet. William bit back a shout as he realized that it wasn't Renamon's fist colliding with his head. Looking around he saw that the others had heard it to. All attention seemed focused on the sound, and the memory of Will's indecency was forgotten.

"Guys?" William asked.

"Shh," hissed Ryan, making a _shushing _motion with his hand. Richoemon was up and looking tense, and another _thump_ could be heard. The group of children and their partners made their way into Rika's front yard, joining Caramon and Dagmon, who were already there and looking in the direction of the noise. Dagmon growled, menacingly.

"Dagmon?" Asked Reno. "What's going…?"

Reno was interrupted by the sound of a massive explosion from the direction of Shinjuku Park, and a crimson orb was sent rocketing into the sky. Ryan's eyes narrowed as he followed its path. He had a sneaking suspicion as to what, no, _whom _it was from.

"He's here," Ryan said under his breath.

"Goodness, gracious. Great balls of fire." Said Caramon jokingly, though he really didn't sound very enthusiastic about it.

"Let's go!" Shouted Rika as she pulled out a card and slid it through her D-Arc. "Digi-Modify! Digivolution activate!" As the card exited the slot in Rika's digivice, Renamon was immediately surrounded by a blue sphere of data.

"RENAMON, DIGIVOLVE TOOO…"

Bits of data stripped themselves off of Renamon as pieces of her code were modified and reorganized. When the transformation was complete, the sphere burst apart, revealing a yellow, four legged fox with nine tails and blue flames on their tips and on her feet.

"KYUBIMON!" The new digimon shouted as it announced its new name for all the world to hear. Rika ran over to her partner and then, oddly enough nearly stumbled as though something had almost tripped her up. Looking downward, Rika's face became livid as she saw the cause of her near misfortune.

_Oh, of all the…this day just keeps getting better and better. _"All right! Which one of you digimon decided to use my yard as a public restroom?!"

Reno's face became as the color of Guilmon. _Dagmon,_ he thought. _You and I are going to have a little talk when we get home…_

_-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------_

"SPIRAL BONE CRUSHER!"

Black Wargreymon shrugged the attack aside as though it were nothing, and quickly counter attacked with a vicious Dragon Crusher slash, throwing the SkullMammothmon to the ground hard. Black Wargreymon gathered energy between his hands to form a crimson sphere, and raised it above his head to deliver the final blow.

"TERRA DESTROY…Ooof!" A well-timed attack with SkullMammothmon's tusks knocked Black Wargreymon to the ground, and sent his Terra Destroyer attack flying into the sky. Biting back a curse, Black Wargreymon rose to his feet in time to catch hold of his foes tusks. Slowly, very slowly, Black Wargreymon forced back his foe. Shoving him backwards to gain some room, he leapt upwards and smashed his gauntlets down on the vaccine digimon. SkullMamothmon went down with a groan, and his data almost lost cohesion.

Black Wargreymon drew his arm back to deliver the final blow.

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_Fool,_ thought the boy as he typed hurriedly on his computer, determined to end this battle as quickly as possible. When he saw the boy's face as he approached, he immediately ran it through his author profile and discovered the identity of his foe, and swiftly locked him out of his account. Denied of the use of his author abilities, _John_ was now just another Tamer up against a mega digimon. Of course, when he bio-merged with his partner Tapirmon into SkullMammothmon, there was some cause to worry. Vaccines do have type advantage over Viruses after all, but Black Wargreymon was backed by the power of an author, which made him nearly unstoppable.

As he wrote the line that had the Virus mega draw back his arm that would delete his foe, his author senses picked something up.

"_DRAGON WHEEL!" _Shouted a voice in his mind.

_What the…?_ The boy thought.

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A flaming blue dragon smashed into Black Wargreymon's back. While the attack wasn't strong enough to do any serious damage, it did surprise him enough to knock him aside. Within seconds Kyubimon with Rika on her back came into view.

"Good work Kyubimon…" began Rika, but she was interrupted by a shout of rage.

"TERRA DESTROYER!" A sphere of crimson light, smaller than the one that had previously been tossed accidentally into the sky, crashed into the ground where Kyubimon stood and threw Rika and her partner aside like two rag dolls. Black Wargreymon scoffed disdainfully at the female Tamer and her partner.

_As if they could stand a chance against me,_ he thought.

"INFERNO BLAST!" A giant maelstrom of fire suddenly enveloped him and he leapt away, actually shouting in pain from the intense heat. Looking in the direction where the fire came from he saw three Champion level digimon approaching him. Black Wargreymon's eyes narrowed as he recognized them.

_No wonder why that attack hurt so much more than the other one. Two of them are vaccines._

And on top of that, they were among the ones that he had been hunting.

Grinning evilly underneath his helm, Black Wargreymon charged towards the group of digimon, his Dramon Destroyers extended, and ready to deliver death to his adversaries.

That was when a light that could only be digivolution enveloped two of them. Wasting no time, he began gathering negative energy between his gauntlets as the two digimon cried out their evolution.

"DRACARAMON!"

"LUNASMON!"

"DIGIVOLVE TOOO…"

"TERRA DESTROYER!" Hurling the crimson sphere at the digimon, it smashed into them, interrupting their digivolution and reverted two of them back to their rookie forms. Terradramon, who having not been able to digivolve (and so was not seen as much of a threat as the others) struggled to get back to his feet. Even though he had not received the full force of the blow, it still boiled down to one thing:

He was a champion that had been near the receiving end of a mega's attack. 'Nuff said.

Ignoring the champion, Black Wargreymon gathered more energy and prepared to throw it, only to be interrupted by an unexpected attack.

"DIAMOND STORM!" Shards of crystals shattered upon the mega digimon's form, not harming him in the least.

"Weakling!" Black Wargreymon growled, and swatted Renamon aside. While he was far from gentle with his blow, he was still under orders to not destroy the canon characters, no matter who they were or what they did.

The OC's however, were another story.

Reno's D-Comp had begun to glow as he took in the situation, and Black Wargreymon noticed it, and knew full well that this glow did not normally mean good things for someone who was not on the same side as the owner of that light.

"Not this time kid," The dark mega said as he flung his crimson sphere at the boy.

"TERRA DESTROYER!" He shouted.

Reno had been feeling a great surge of energy roaring through his veins. So caught up was he in the rush that he did not notice the attack that made its way towards him.

"RENO! GET DOWN!" Shouted a voice, and the teenager was shoved to the ground. The attack just narrowly missed him as it exploded where he had stood. He heard a roar of anguish that sounded like Terradramon, but he couldn't be sure.

That was when his eyes locked onto the battered and cracked digivice that came flying out of the smoke; a digivice that belonged to Ryan.

The power roared through him as understanding blazed a trail through his mind. Rage leapt up and fed the flames, and the light from his D-Comp darkened as Reno uttered a howl that was not quite human. Nearby, his partner, Dagmon's eyes glowed with a red, murderous light.

"DARK BIO-DIGIVOLUTION," spoke the D-Comp attached to the boy's wrist.

15


	14. Chapter 14

Disclaimer: Again and again I must say this: I do not own Digimon. Not one iota.

The Wages of Fans is Fiction: Chapter 14

Izzy blinked, hoping that he had just misheard what Koji had just told him.

"I'm sorry, but could you repeat what you just said?"

Koji nodded. " I'm a character on an online website known as the FanFic Domain, and so are you."

"But how?" Asked Izzy. "I don't have any memories concerning this _Fanfic Domain_. And my friends and I are all fictional characters? It just seems so…_unreal_." But somehow, for reasons that Izzy could not explain, he felt _comfortable _with this knowledge, as though he had been familiar with it all his life. Under other circumstances, he would have thought that he would have, no, _should have_, denied everything that the boy had told him, and after a brief fit of irrationality thrown the kid out of his home. Of course, Izzy wasn't that sort of person. His calm, logical mind wanted to know even more about this strange "double life" that he seemed to have lived.

He didn't once consider the possibility that this boy may have been lying.

"I don't know how I can explain this," said Koji. "And I don't know why you're acting as if you don't know what's going on, but I can't help but think that it has something to do with that author that I fought earlier."

Izzy's eyes widened slightly. "An author? You mean that kid that fought you earlier when you became a digimon? The one wearing the trench coat?" Koji nodded.

"That's him. I can't remember his name, but I do know that he's a fan of 'The Matrix' movies, which is what he based his avatar form on."

"Avatar form?"

"The image that an author can take when they enter the FanFic Domain. It sometimes has great powers, and can share characteristics in whatever show or story that they work with the most. You should see the avatars from the _Gundam Wing_ series. They're…interesting to watch when they get into high gear."

"I see," said Izzy. "So these authors enter our world and what? Write stories about us?"

"Well, it's a bit more complicated than that, but yeah. Writers will dabble in just about anything depending on their interests. Some will go for action and adventure, humor, horror, angst, romance…you name it, and it's been done. Though the censors try to be a little more on top of that sort of thing than they used to be."

Izzy didn't bother asking what it was that he meant by that. He could connect the dots himself, but he still had to ask one thing.

"These _censors_. Are they the Domain's version of a representative authority?"

"I guess that you could call them that. They keep us around when we're not in a TV show, or no longer a part of the regular line of fiction as when a fad dries up and a show goes off the air, or a particular book series no longer graces the number one best seller's lists. As a rule, they keep an eye on things, make sure that no one plagiarizes, or writes material that's obscene or considered too _risqué_. It's not always observed or enforced either, but the rules are there. The only time that the censors really do get involved is when two or more authors get involved in a Flaming war that disrupts the normal flow of stories and causes damage to the world's that they're in. I recall one flamer who took it upon herself to try and 'flame out' my friend Zoe because she couldn't stand the story that she was in. Some parts of my hometown still haven't fully recovered from that one."

Izzy nodded in understanding, and then a memory came to him. He realized that he _had been at _the incident that Koji had just described. Had tried to put a rational face on things and get the author to back down, and when things got ugly Tentomon digivolved to MegaKabuterimon and fought him.

And it wasn't the first flame war that he had been in either. The Taiora/Sorato Affair had probably been the worst of them, and had been the reason why rules against flame wars had been instituted in the first place. Not that it did much of course, but things were a lot more peaceful than they had been when the Domain was first formed.

"Nnnngh…" Izzy suddenly gripped the sides of his head as a headache tore through his brain. Koji rushed over to him, asking what was wrong, but Izzy wasn't able to answer. Something was happening. The world was spinning. He wanted it to stop, but it didn't. It just got worse.

As Izzy passed out, the sky off in the horizon turned a sickeningly shade of black.

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The boy sat up at his desk, and his fingers paused at the keyboard.

_He remembers,_ the boy thought frantically. _I don't believe it, but Izzy remembers! I was too late! _

Quickly checking on the other characters, he found that so far none of them appeared to show any signs of regaining their memories, but that didn't mean that he was out of the woods. Izzy might find a way to get the others to remember, and if they did it was game-over for his story. The _True Story_, as he called it, would be ended before it was truly even begun! This mustn't be allowed!

Of course, there was the problem that had just developed in Shinjuku. Black Wargreymon had just successfully deleted one of the OC's, but the act of doing so has triggered one of the most famous and perilous events to ever dominate the Digimon universe:

A dark digivolution.

One of the OC's had just merged with his partner digimon and was transforming into a creature of enormous strength and ferocity. And when he meant enormous, he meant _enormous_. While the creature didn't surpass Megidramon in that department, it was still strong enough to give even Black Wargreymon a run for his money, and being an OC character, it no doubt had abilities that even _he _didn't suspect. What was a writer to do?

Believing that Black Wargreymon had now outlived his usefulness he turned his attention away from the battle. If Black Wargreymon lost, the creature that destroyed him would no doubt turn on its allies (as commonly happens with that kind of evolution) and destroy them with ease. If not, he could always come after them later, and if by some chance Black Wargreymon survived, he could still finish the job that was appointed to him and save the _Lord of Fantasy _the effort of doing it himself. No harm, no foul.

As he prepared to focus his attention on Izzy, something else came to his attention.

_No,_ the Lord of Fantasy thought. _It can't be. Oh, those idiots…_

_-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------_

Tai and Matt had caught up with Sora, Biyomon, Agumon and Gabumon when all hell suddenly broke loose. Two armored figures burst from out of a building, locked in extreme combat. The clash of steel as their fists collided with each other rang throughout the street. Tai and Matt reflexively covered covered Sora with their bodies as shards of glass and concrete fell to the ground, but they needn't have bothered. Light shone from their digivices, and they were swiftly covered by those who were more able to take such blows.

"AGUMON!"

"GABUMON!"

"BIYOMON!"

"DIGIVOLVE TOOO…"

"GREYMON!"

"GARURUMON!"

"BIRDRAMON!"

Looking up, they saw the forms of their partner digimon. A great horned orange skinned saurian with a carapace covering his face, a blue tiger-striped wolf, and a giant flaming bird. As Tai prepared to order Greymon into the fray he caught site of Matt's arms wrapped around his fiancé. For reasons that he couldn't divulge he felt a stab of jealousy in his heart, but he swiftly repressed it. This wasn't the time for those sorts of emotions.

In the time space that he had taken to temporarily sort out his emotions, Matt had taken the initiative to give orders to his wolf friend.

"GARURUMON! STOP THOSE GUYS BEFORE THEY DO ANY MORE DAMAGE!"

Growling in response, the blue wolf leapt at the two combatants and fired a blue stream of energy at them, causing them to break apart from their struggle in utter surprise.

"It's him," said one of the armored creatures. "The legendary Garurumon…"

The other one swiftly knocked his adversary down a second later. "Who cares?!" It demanded. "This is between you and me! Don't hide behind a Digi-destined like that _things _partner and _fight _me!" Shaping his arm into a sword he leapt forward and stabbed his adversary in the chest. There was a burst of light, and the words _logging out_ could be heard. When the light died down, only the armored figure with the sword shaped arm remained, standing triumphantly. Turning its head, it scanned the battlefield until its eyes settled on Garurumon, and then on the Digi-destined and digimon behind him. Raising its 'sword-arm' it spoke.

"Now, I shall do what I set out to do. Matt Ishida. Garurumon. Prepare for death…"

"NO!" Sora shouted, and her digivice glowed. Above them, Birdramon glowed with a twin light, and spoke the words that symbolized her digivolution.

"BIRDRAMON, DIGIVOLVE TOOO…"

"GARUDAMON!"

In the place of the fire-winged digimon now floated a half bird, half human decorated with Hindu symbols, and wearing a red facemask. The armored creature was unimpressed.

"So, you defend Matt anyway. I am disgusted with you. You _belong_ to Tai, and no one else! How could you possibl…"

"Hey!" Shouted Matt. "She doesn't _belong_ to anybody. Now, who are you and what's going on here?"

"Yeah," said Tai. "And why do you want to destroy Matt? What's he done to you?"

From the sound of the thing's voice, the Digi-destined could have sworn that it was smiling. "It's not about what he did to me, Tai, but what he did to you."

"What do you mean?" Asked Sora. "And how do you know our names?"

"It doesn't matter. Not to you at least. Say your last goodbye to Blondie there, because in a few minutes he'll be nothing. Not even a memory."

"Get real, dude!" Shouted Tai as he stood side by side with his best friend. Matt looked over at him and the two shared a comforting smile, as on their chests, blazing for all to see, were the dual crests of courage and friendship. Remembering a similar moment when they stood side by side like this to fulfill a prophecy that had held the key to defeating Venom Myotismon. Never since had they felt so sure that it would work, even though there was a risk that they could have been hurt. That moment had defined their friendship in a way that even their later disagreement during the crisis with the Dark Masters hadn't been able to break. Sora looked at the two boys and smiled as Greymon and Garurumon de-digivolved and then shone with a new light that matched that of the crests perfectly.

"AGUMON!"

"GABUMON!"

"WARP DIGIVOLVE TOOO…"

"WAR GREYMON!"

"METAL GARURUMON!"

The figure that stood before them nodded as though he were disappointed.  
"So, this is what you have chosen. A pity, but then that's what I would have expected out of the Lord of Fantasy. No matter, it is time to die…"

"NO!"

Before it could even react, a clawed gauntlet similar to War Greymon's tore through the creature's armored form as though it were butter. As it slowly began to vanish, the creature inclined its head so that it could see whom it was that had done it in. It recognized the form immediately.

"Why?" It mouthed as its form began to lose integrity.

"Because," the newcomer said lowly. "You have dared to meddle in affairs that weren't yours to meddle in. "I told you to do _nothing_ to the canon characters, and you spat in my face. Now know that the justice of the Lord of Fantasy is unrelenting." And with that, the figure brought its claws in for the kill and there was another flash of light, followed by those same words _logging out_ at the end of it.

The three Digi-destined stood there, stunned by what had transpired. The figure turned to them, and spoke in a voice that was almost sorrowful.

"There's been a change in plans. I had hoped that I could do this without any interference, but unfortunately events strive to take the tale out of my control. Perhaps, when things have settled I can go back and clean things up. That's what _editing_ is for after all."

"What do you mean?" Asked Tai.

"You'll find out. Well, rather your friend Matt will. You and the others will have no memory of what happens here. I'm sorry for having to delegate this matter, but there is something else that I must attend to. Now then…" The entity raised a clawed gauntlet and Tai and Wargreymon suddenly screamed. A second later their eyes were filled with a crimson glare and they turned their sights on Matt and Metal Garurumon.

"Tai?" Asked the figure. "I believe it's time that you and Matt finished that Battle that you had in the digital world. What do you think?"

"TERRA FORCE!" Was Wargreymon's response as he began his attack on Metal Garurumon.

10


	15. Chapter 15

Disclaimer: Like my fellow readers and writers on this site, I do _not _own Digimon.

The Wages of Fans is Fiction: Chapter 15

Lightning flashed as the sky turned pitch black. Fear became an overwhelming presence in the air, almost as though it had become a second atmosphere. Rika awoke to this, not at all comprehending what was going on. She looked over at the group of OC's that had quite literally landed in front of her, inadvertently rescuing her from a certain fate decreed by an author just because he had been writing the story. Most of the digimon looked a little ragged, and worn around the edges. Chris held Caramon in his arms, and had a look on his face that could only be described as shock, a look that was matched by William and Gaomon who stood next to him. Richoemon was down and unconscious, bits of data dispersing as he reversed digivolved. Renamon had apparently frozen in the act of getting back up as she looked in the direction that Chris and William were staring at. Rika followed their gaze Rika felt herself go rigid to.

_Oh God, no…_was all she thought.

A black sphere stood before Black Wargreymon, intense winds blowing around it, preventing the Mega digimon from being able to formulate any kind of attack. The ground around it first shattered, and then melted until it became swamp-like. The dark sphere sunk into it slowly and as it finally vanished, the winds died down. Black Wargreymon stood for a moment, waiting for something to happen, but seeing as how nothing did, he simply grunted and began to advance towards the children. Rika got up, and pulled out her digivice, getting ready to Bio-merge with her partner. Her eyes slid over the group one more time as her D-Arc began to make beeping noises.

_Where're Ryan, Reno, and Dagmon?_ She wondered.

Before she could do anything else, events just spun out of control.

As Black Wargreymon crossed the threshold where the dark Digi-egg had vanished, the ground began to rumble. Instinctively, Black Wargreymon leapt into the air just as the ground exploded from beneath him.

He had been close to getting away. He had been very close.

But close only counts in two things: Horse shoes, and hand grenades.

A jaw fastened itself around Black Wargreymon's legs with murderous force, and the sound of armor being crushed could be distinctly heard. For the first time the virus mega actually screamed in pain and turned his claws on the creature that attacked him.

"DRAGON CRUSHER!" He shouted as he slashed again and again at his assailant's mouth, to no avail. The creature held on tight, and what was more its mouth actually tightened it grip. Screaming again, Black Wargreymon leveled a Terra Destroyer attack at his foe at point blank range. There was a massive explosion, and Black Wargreymon was thrown free for his efforts, though his actions were not without consequences. His armor was cracked and battered in multiple places, but the worst of the damage that he had suffered was around his legs. Data leaked from the ruins of his shin guards, and for a moment he was content to just lie there and lick his wounds. His other enemies were hardly in the position to destroy him, even in his weakened state. He didn't stay this way for long however. He needed to see what kind of condition he had left his attacker in.

The dirt kicked up from the blast began to clear, and a form began to emerge from it. As Black Wargreymon struggled to stand, he felt fear for the first time in his life.

"Shades of Megidramon," whispered Chris. What he saw standing before him, was…_massive_. There just didn't seem to be any other way to describe the enormousness of the beast that was the corrupted Biomerged form of their two friends Reno and Dagmon. It easily matched Azulongmon in terms of size, maybe even dwarfed him in fact. Unless they were able to give the Sovereign a call for a size comparison they would never know for sure. The creature was wolf-like in appearance, resembling something of Dagmon's champion form Lunasmon. Bits of charred metal were fused into its body, and more hung off it like the cobwebs from a dank, dark basement. Its body looked decayed and rotten, and a sound could be heard emanating from its throat that was not quite a growl or a hiss, but rather a combination of both. It fixed one cold eye on Black Wargreymon, and its pupil dilated.

"Drosslunasmon," stated William as he read off the stats of the monster. "Mega level, virus type. Its attack, Corrosion Plume, is a highly corrosive blast that eats away at the enemy. Born from feelings of immense rage and the need to take revenge, it is considered the blight of the digital world. Its dark powers remain a mystery."

"But why?" Asked Chris. "What could make Reno do this? What could possibly make him mad enough to do this to his partner? Ryan, what do you thi…?" Chris paused, frowned, and took a look around.

"Hey," he said. "Where's Ryan?"

"Took the words right out of my mouth," said Rika as she made her way over to them, her eyes still intent on the scene before them.

"Don't know," said William. "The last time I saw him was right before we got smacked by Black Wargreymon's Terra Force attack."

"It's _Terra Destroyer _Will," said Chris.

"Oh, whatever," said Rika. "Could one of you _please _tell me what the heck is going on, in as few words as possible?"

"Okay. Reno biomerged with his partner and now this is turning into a Megidramon episode," said Caramon.

"Don't worry though," said William with dry sarcasm. "If I know my Digimon shows, he'll calm down in about five minutes and slide-evolve into his true form."

"William, be serious! We are _not_ in a fic this time! We could end up getting killed here!"

As if to emphasize the point, Drosslunasmon charged towards Black Wargreymon, and spewed a vicious stream of steaming acid at the mega, who just barely dodged. Forced on the defensive, he grabbed the split shield behind his back and brought them in front of his body just in time to block another hefty dose of the corrosive liquid. As the attack ceased, Black Wargreymon cursed as he heard the sounds of hissing as the acid began eating its way through the barrier. Not willing to discard its usefulness, he flew straight towards Drosslunasmon and smashed it into his face, hoping that the acid on its surface would have some effect on its previous owner. Unfortunately, getting so close meant that his foe was able to counter attack, which he did by smashing a claw into Black Wargreymon's face. As he hurtled to the ground, he saw with more than a little satisfaction that the acid on his shield was having an affect on Drosslunasmon.

This satisfaction lasted exactly three seconds.

As Black Wargreymon watched, a mud-like substance affixed itself to the injury, hardened, and crumpled, revealing reconstructed data.

_No…_Was all Black Wargreymon thought as gravity forced him to complete his journey to the ground.

"Um… should we be doing something?" Asked Gaomon.

"What," said William. "Watching Black Wargreymon getting his butt kicked isn't 'doing something'?"

"Well, I was just thinking that, based on past episodes of Digimon, and what we know about dark digivolution, can we expect Reno or Dagmon to _not_ attack us after he's finished up with Black Wargreymon?"

"Are you saying that we should _help_ the mon that just tried to kill us? Have you lost your mind, Betty?"

"Will," Gaomon growled. "I'm being serious here…"

"I agree with Blue Boy here," said Rika. "It's better to take the devil we know over the devil that we don't. And with Black Wargreymon in the condition that he's in, I don't think that he's up to destroying us."

"Didn't you try something similar to this in the TV show?" Asked Chris.

"Yeah, what's your point?"

"That it failed."

Rika frowned. "We didn't have a mega on our side at the time…"

"A data type against two viruses, both on the same level as Sakuyamon. Why am I not feeling optimistic about this?"

"Look, either you help out, or stay out of the way. In either case, shut- _up_! I'm still going in. Renamon. You ready?"

"Always Ri…" Renamon stopped suddenly and her eyes widened. Without a word, she dashed towards the battlefield.

"RENAMON! WHAT ARE YOU DOING?!" Rika shouted after her.

Black Wargreymon hit the ground rolling and without thinking, without _looking_, he formed a small burning star and threw it as he landed on his back. Luck was with him as his attack smashed into Drosslunasmon, knocking him backwards and thus saving himself from being crushed by the enraged mega. Not so lucky for an unconscious Tamer and his Tapirmon, as they lay in the path of Drosslunasmon's falling form.

Tapirmon struggled to waken his partner, and had finally succeeded only to note that he was too late. Not willing to abandon his partner, Tapirmon stood beside John, and waited for the end to come.

There was a yellow blur, and Tapirmon suddenly felt as though he had suddenly gained wings. A moment later he was set on the ground alongside his partner, who blinked at his rescuer.

"R-R-Renamon?" John stuttered weakly, trying to get his bearings.

"Shhh," Renamon said with surprising gentleness. "It's all right, but I want you to get out of here."

"But…" John began only to be cut off by the vixen digimon.

"Go. You've done all you can for now. Rika and I will do what we can, and hopefully things will turn out well. And please, stay safe." And with that, Renamon phased out of existence, and appeared back at Rika's side. Everyone watched her with wide eyes. Well, everyone except Rika, who simply looked at her a little coolly.

_Renamon,_ thought John. _We've gotta stop meeting like this._

"BIOMERGE ACTIVATE!" Called out Rika Nonaka as she held her D-Arc to the sky. A bright light enveloped her as she was transformed into data and merged with Renamon.

"RENAMON, BIOMERGE TOOO…"

"SAKUYAMON!" As the light faded, Rika and Renamon were replaced by a shaman digimon with a fox facemask, and golden armor with purple gloves and boots. Long silver hair flowed behind her as she held her staff in a confident manner. Yet Sakuyamon didn't move. Her attention seemed to be focused on something else.

"Um," said Caramon. "What is she doing? Shouldn't she be getting over there to smack some sense into Reno?"

Beneath her facemask, Sakuyamon frowned.

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_Rika looked at Drosslunasmon, or rather into his core, which contained the pure, unbridled fury of the Tamer known as Reno. The digital sphere that contained him burned with a black flame that threatened to consume him at every turn, yet he did not seem to care. He looked as though he was beyond caring. Rika had seen this look on Takato once in the digital world when Leomon was deleted before their very eyes, and it was frightening to see it repeated again._

_"Renamon," she asked. "Why is he like this? What's causing him so much anguish?"_

_Renamon did not reply in words. As Rika watched Reno writhe in his core, she caught a glimpse of an image in her minds eye, and understanding settled heavily on her shoulders._

_"No…" she whispered._

_-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------_

"No…" Sakuyamon whispered as a tear made its way down her cheek. Because her back was turned to the others they didn't notice, but they did hear what she said.

"Sakuyamon?" Asked Chris. "Is everything all right?"

Sakuyamon looked over at the unconscious Richoemon and wondered what she was going to tell him when he woke up.

_"Rika,"_ spoke Renamon's voice. _"We don't have time for this. We must intervene now or all is lost!"_

_'So much has already been lost,' _thought Rika, but she knew that Renamon was right. Something _had _to be done, regardless of what she had learned. She had already survived too much to just let go of life without a fight. Lifting up gently into the air, Rika and Renamon began to speak in a voice that held not only sorrow, but also healing and forgiveness. A light began to emit from her as it cascaded over the area, bathing everything in its radiance.

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Black Wargreymon was pinned. It was over now, he was sure of it. He had tried calling to the author for aid, but the Lord of Fantasy was quiet this time around. Feeling a weight in his dark heart, Black Wargreymon had an idea that he had been abandoned; discarded as though he were just a tool that had served its purpose and was now no longer needed or worth helping. This thought enraged him, but there was nothing that he could do about it. Silently he wished that he had had the chance to take his frustration out on his betraying 'father'.

And then there was light.

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_"Hallowed friendship,"_ intoned Rika in perfect sync with her partner. _"The ties that bind us all the stronger, offer healing and hope to this warrior's wounded soul."_

As the light died down, Reno and Dagmon were kneeling on the ground. Dagmon blinked, as though he were unsure as to where he was, while beside him Reno struggled to hold back his tears. Black Wargreymon got up slowly from where he had been pinned, looking at the boy carefully before taking off into the sky.

With another glow of light, Sakuyamon parted into the forms of Rika and Renamon. Renamon phased over to a nearby crater and picked something from off the ground while Rika walked over to Reno laid a comforting hand on his shoulder while he shook uncontrollably. The others, including John and Tapirmon, joined them but said nothing. Renamon soon appeared beside Rika and handed something to her. Chris gave Rika a questioning look.

"I know what happened to Ryan," she said lowly. This caught the others attention and they all looked at her, including John even though he had no idea who Ryan was.

Clearing her throat, Rika took a second to collect herself before she said anything, to make sure that she wouldn't lose it herself.

"Ryan," she said slowly. "Ryan is dead."

6


	16. Chapter 16

Disclaimer: I have never owned Digimon. I never will.

The Wages of Fans is Fiction: Chapter 16

He floated in the void, eyes closed and resting. Exhaustion filled every inch of his body, but it was the good kind of exhaustion. It was the type where you could drift forever in oblivion and not have a care in the world. Everything was done and over with, and there were no worries to hold you down. _How had I gotten here?_ He wondered. No answer came. His memory was fuzzy for some reason, as though it was something that wasn't important anymore. Discarding the thought, he went back to the tranquility of the grayness that now filled his mind. He felt so tired…

A soft voice called to him. At least he thought that it was calling to him. He hadn't seen anyone else around when he had taken a look earlier, but he found that he didn't really care. The voice didn't leave him alone however, and called out a name that sounded very familiar to him for some reason.

"Five more minutes," he said to the voice, hoping that it would be quiet and eventually go away. If the voice heard, it gave no signs of hearing or caring, and continued on anyway.

"Your time's not up," the voice said calmly. "You have a destiny to fulfill."

"This is something of a cliché," he told the voice. "The whole disembodied voice talking to a dead guy, telling him that the bill of life hasn't come due for him yet." He frowned and opened his eyes. "I am _dead_, aren't I?"

The voice chuckled dryly. "Guess that depends on your definition of 'existance'. You see, you were a character in a story."

"I'm a figment of someone's imagination? That's not so bad I guess…"

"Not really," spoke the voice. "You see, you participate in a genre of writing called _fan fiction_. You are a made up character who works alongside canon characters. You're not even meant to exist in their worlds. You're less real than they are, and now you're dead."

"Way to spread the Christmas cheer pal."

"Hey, if you want comfort, go talk to a cherub or something. I'm just telling it like it is, and besides we're here to talk about your destiny."

"What destiny?" He asked the voice. Things were becoming a little clearer in his mind now, but events were still just out of his grasp. "The destiny of being dead? Just show me the door and I'm out of here, unless that is I'm supposed to be going down to the bad place…"

This time the voice laughed a hearty laugh. "No, no. If you were that bad you wouldn't be here."

"Still not good enough to get into the other place though…"

"Eh. Your life's not really over yet, and besides you're in a unique position to have an affect on events. That is, if you trust me."

"How can I trust you? I don't think I've ever even met you."

"Well, technically you have, we just didn't have a whole lot of time to chit-chat. What I'm getting at is, I could compel you to do what I want, but it's kind of against the rules. Plus it would be bad for you as well as for me. Better if you're willing."

"Why do you need me, anyway?"

"Because, things that weren't meant to be changed are. And things that haven't been decided and probably never will be are having fate forced onto them, leaving no room for other possibilities. People have the right to choose, and that right is being taken from them."

"The way I see it though," the boy told the voice. "Is that none of us really have a choice in the matter. None of the _characters_ featured in the stories have much of a choice as to where the tale goes. Well, not all the time anyway, but I know I didn't. I didn't want this kind of life."

The voice was silent for a moment.

"Good," it finally said. "You're remembering. That'll make things easier during the transition. Are you ready?"

"Huh? I haven't even given you my answer."

"You already have just by remembering. It shows that you want to live, and that you want to see your friends again. That bond must be pretty strong if you're willing to go beyond the grave for them."

"How do I know that this decision isn't being forced on me?"

The voice sighed. "The only comfort that I can give you is that this choice isn't coming from me. After all, I'm not your creator."

"…"

"Well?"

"All right. I'm comin'."

"Good. Steady yourself. The experience can be a tad bit…_unsettling_."

He was just about to ask what the voice meant when memories came crashing down on him.

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"MEGA CLAW!" Shouted Wargreymon as he slashed at Metal Garurumon. Dodging it, the cyborg wolf leapt into the air, hoping to get him away from the children and buy time for Matt and Sora to figure out a way to snap Wargreymon and Tai out of whatever control that was being exerted over them. However, he wasn't fast enough to dodge another Mega Claw slash, and Metal Garurumon went crashing into some cars across the street. Wargreymon charged after him, only to be caught off guard by Metal Garurumon's Giga Missile attack launched from his stomach.

"AAAARGH!" Wargreymon shouted in rage. Not wasting any time, Metal Garurumon opened a number of hidden compartments around his body and fired missiles from them, each of them impacting dead on Wargreymon's body and causing ice to form and freeze him in place. For the moment, the mega warrior was immobilized.

"Tai!" Shouted Matt. "You've got to fight this!"

"You're under some evil digimon's control," said Sora. "You can break free of it! I know you can!"

Tai just looked at Matt, his eyes still holding their red glow. "Fight?" He spoke to Matt. "Is that what you want? Then come and get it!" And with that, before anyone could react, Tai leapt at his friend and wrestled him to the ground. Holding onto his friend's wrists, Matt struggled to throw him off, but whatever control that had robbed Tai of his free will also gave him an insane amount of strength. Slowly, Tai's hands began to reach for Matt's neck.

"TAI! NO!" Shouted Sora as she wrapped her arms around her fiancés waist and tried to pull him off, but to no avail. For all intents and purposes Tai might as well have been glued to Matt. Sora looked up pleadingly at Garudamon, her eyes begging her partner to do something. She didn't like the idea of having a digimon get involved, but there seemed to be little choice in the matter.

"That's enough…" began Garudamon as she moved her claw in to part the two Digi-destined, but the sound of ice cracking caught her attention.

"TERRA FORCE!!!" An orange ball of fire smashed into Garudamon a second later, forcing her to reverse digivolve back to Biyomon. Sora shouted her name.

"RAAARGH!" Howled Metal Garurumon as his jaws latched onto Wargreymon's left arm. Wargreymon responded by kicking the cyborg wolf in the midsection and swiftly threw him off. Drawing back a clawed gauntlet he prepared to finish his friend off.

"No. Don't…" moaned Metal Garurumon as the claws began to descend towards his face.

As Wargreymon's claws traveled the distance towards their inevitable destination, he smiled grimly beneath his helm, even though something within him begged him to stop this madness before it was too late. Begged for anyone, anything to stop him before he couldn't undo what he was doing.

And then there was an obstruction in his path, and his claws froze inches away from Metal Garurumon head.

Actually, an obstruction didn't quite describe it. If Wargreymon was looking at it right, his right arm seemed to have passed through a young boy with deep forest green eyes and shaggy brown hair, his arms thrown up protectively over his body. Not that it did much good mind you. But there was something strange about the situation, because he could see right _through_ the child. It was as if he wasn't really there. Wargreymon's eyes locked with that of the child and the crimson glow in his eyes receded, as did that in Tai's. As one, Tai and Wargreymon pulled back and looked around, as if wondering what they were doing. When Wargreymon looked back, the boy was gone. Closing his eyes, Wargreymon felt something released from within him and a glow enveloped his body, and he reverted back to his in-training stage of Koromon.

Matt took a deep breath once Tai's hands released their grip from around his neck, only to have the breath almost crushed from his lungs as his best friend pulled him into a fierce hug, whispering over and over _I'm sorry Matt_ as tears soaked the back of his shirt. Sora watched them for a few seconds, hoping that it wasn't just a trick before kneeling down and wrapping her arms around her two friends.

_He remembers,_ Matt thought, though not really knowing what meant by it.

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Above the three young adults a specter rushed away from them as it felt something distant calling, pulling it away from the touching scene.

_Man,_ it thought. _I seem to have bad luck with Wargreymon's._

_-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------_

Outside an apartment building, a young boy handed two pictures to a pair of digimon who, at the moment, had been made to morph into human appearance so as not to be noticed.

"Destroy this one," the boy told them, pointing to one of the pictures. "But bring the other one to me, alive and unharmed. Understood?"

The two digimon nodded.

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Mimi had heard the boy Koji shouting something from the room that he and Izzy had shut themselves in and both she and Palmon went over to it. The girl knocked on the door once and asked if everything was all right. When she didn't get an answer immediately she began to turn the door knob, only to be beaten to the punch by Koji, who threw the door open, making her stumble through the entrance.

"Mimi!" He said. "We have a problem!" Looking to where he was pointing, she saw the still form of Izzy Izumi lying on the ground, and immediately went over to him.

"What happened?!" Mimi demanded, a raw edge of panic creeping its way into her voice.

"I don't know," the boy responded. "One minute we were talking, and the next he grabbed his head like he was having a headache, and then he fainted."

Mimi looked over to her partner. "Palmon?" Nodding in agreement, Palmon wrapped Izzy up in her vines, and with Mimi and Koji's help, they carried him into the living room and set him down on the couch. Davis and Kari both raised their eyebrows and were about to ask what had happened when Mimi told them to wet down a washcloth and bring it to her. After this was done, Mimi draped the cloth over her boyfriend's forehead.

_Oh, Izzy,_ she thought. _Please be all right…_

As if in response to the girl's silent prayer, Izzy moaned and slowly opened his eyes. "Mimi…?" He said quietly.

"It's all right Izzy," she said softly. "Just tell me what happened…"

Before Izzy could say anything, there was a soft knock on the apartment door, followed by an explosion that tore the door off its hinges and shattered it into thousands of tiny splinters. As the Digi-destined watched, a human female in dark clothing entered the room and then changed into a pale skinned digimon with long white hair, with gothic style clothing and red eyes.

It was LadyDevimon.

"Warrior of Light," she spoke to Koji. "It is time for you to die."

"What a day for Veemon and Gatomon to be on a date," said Davis dryly.

9


	17. Chapter 17

A/N: Some author's have said that story writing is a lot easier when they're listening to music. I write this story while listening to the song of 'Minority' by Green Day, which has a fun beat to it. As a result, I can definitely say that writing this story is a lot more fun and easier. Wonder if that means anything. Well, now that that random thought is out of the way, on with the Fic!

Disclaimer: Since _when_ have I ever owned Digimon?

The Wages of Fans is Fiction: Chapter 17

Rika cradled a sobbing Richoemon, trying to sooth him. Not that it was really helping much. Finding out that his best friend had just been killed had been too much of a blow for him to take, more so than anything Black Wargreymon could ever have dished out. None of the others were really holding up to well either. Reno had remained silent when Rika had broken the news to them. Chris however, was a little more vocal.

"What do you mean _Ryan's dead_?"

"Black Wargreymon destroyed him," said Rika a little harshly, trying to choke back the sadness that she felt. "He's gone, and he's not coming back."

"Bull shit!" Shouted Chris. William put a warning hand on his friends arm.

"Chris…" The blonde haired boy shrugged him off.

"I don't believe it. I _refuse_ to believe it!"

"But it's true," Reno finally choked out. The others looked at him. "Ryan knocked me out of the path of Black Wargreymon's attack. Took the blow meant for me for himself. Fanfic character or not, there's no way that he could survive that kind of power…"

"No…" Rika stopped Chris from saying anything else by placing Ryan's battered digivice in his hand. The boy looked at it numbly, and found himself unable to say anything else, and that was when Richoemon woke up, asking everyone what was going on.

He didn't like the answer that he got.

"Renamon," asked John walking over to the vulpine digimon. "What exactly is going on here? Who's this Ryan person?" The kitsune looked at the boy before answering.

"Ryan was an OC that I and the other Tamers had worked alongside with. As I'm sure you've gathered, he was slain in battle protecting an ally."

"Isn't there something that we can do?" Asked John softly. "I mean, this sort of thing happens all the time in fics…"

Renamon shook her head. "I'm sorry John. Unfortunately, this happened outside of a story, so the rules apply differently. If he was an Avatar like you are than perhaps…"

"He's an Avatar?"

John and Renamon looked over to see William glaring at them. Next to him, Gaomon was obviously trying to get his partner's attention, but apparently he wasn't succeeding very well.

"Yeah," said John. "I am."

Without warning William leapt at John, fury painted on his face. Fortunately Renamon was there to stop him before he could do anything and intercepted him in mid flight. It didn't stop Will from screaming at the kid.

"THIS IS _ALL_ YOUR FAULT! ALL OF YOU AUTHORS! YOU AND YOUR STUPID STORIES AND YOUR OBSESSIONS! IF IT WASN'T FOR YOU, I NEVER WOULD HAVE LOST MY FRIE…" William's raging was stopped by a warning squeeze on his shoulder. Spinning him around, Renamon pulled him in closely until his face was just inches away from hers.

"You're going to want to be careful about the way you talk to him," she told him coldly. "This is a terrible time for all of us but that does _not_ mean that you can take your anger out on another who has had nothing to do with Ryan's death. If I hear you speaking that way to John again I will personally ensure that you never speak again, is that clear?"

William looked back unflinchingly at Renamon before nodding. Letting the red haired boy go Renamon stepped back a few paces. Giving one last glare at John, William turned away and walked off, heading for a nearby tree and stopping in front of it. He punched it a second later, growling a bit as he did so.

Renamon placed a hand on John's shoulder. "He doesn't mean it you know," she said trying to reassure the boy. "He's…upset." Renamon gave him a comforting squeeze. She wasn't used to having to comfort people all the time. It wasn't part of her nature.

John nodded, even though he wasn't sure whether or not to believe her.

Renamon sighed as she walked away from John. She was a warrior, not a nurturer, and yet she felt an unusual protectiveness towards the boy. A protectiveness that bordered on almost the same level that she had towards her Tamer. It didn't make sense and at times it frustrated her, ever since she first met the Avatar all those weeks ago. Looking over at Rika, who now held a sleeping Richoemon, she wondered just how it was that humans dealt with these kinds of emotions on a daily basis.

Renamon's senses suddenly picked something up. _Something's coming,_ she thought.

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_This was the place. This was where he felt that he was being drawn to. But why? There were people there, people that he used to know. The specter sighed at the use of the past tense. He used to know them, still did after a fashion, but he felt that his place was no longer among them. Not in his current condition anyway. Yet here he was, being drawn to them and he didn't fight it._

_He was sure that there was a reason behind it after all._

_-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------_

"I don't believe that he's dead either," said William to Gaomon.

"Will…" Gaomon began. He wasn't entirely sure how to go on really. His partner was not in a happy mood and saying anything that contradicted him at this point would only make things worse, but he knew that William had to accept the reality of things, and the sooner the better. Reality held the final say when it came to things of this matter, no matter how much you could deny it.

There was a twisted irony to this logic considering the line of work that they were all in.

"Don't you _dare_ tell me that Ryan _is_ dead TP," said William harshly. "I know Ryan. He's too stubborn to die like this…"

"But he did…"

William waved Gaomon's remark off. "That's why I don't believe it. I'll believe that he's dead when I see his ghost."

"In that case," spoke a familiar voice. "You may not want to turn around."

"You say something, Mike?" Will asked Gaomon as he turned to look at him. "I could have sworn that for a second there you sounded just like…" William stopped. Standing before him and Gaomon was a ghostly image of a boy with shaggy brown hair and green eyes that bore a remarkable resemblance to a friend that just this morning had his hand caught in the door of Tai's apartment.

Will's partner stared at the apparition with eyes so big and round that they practically ate up his face.

"Huh? Wha…? How…? Uuuuh…" Gaomon passed out on the ground with a heavy thud, causing the others to look in their direction. Jaws dropped open in disbelief, but for some of them there was a trace of relief and happiness that was barely being restrained on their faces. William looked down at his partner and frowned.

"Oh, crap…" he grated.

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"Your… alive?" Reno said doubtfully. "No, you can't be. You just took a hit from Black Wargreymon, no one could come out of that in one piece."

"You okay, Reno?" Asked the specter that looked like Ryan. "You look like you've just seen a ghost." The specter forced a grin. Reno frowned.

"If this is some cruel joke…"

"Hey, take it easy," said the apparition, as it held up its hands in a warding gesture. "It _is_ me, Ryan, or at least I was the last time I checked…"

"How?" Asked Rika as she glared at the ghost, who turned to her, his eyes widening as he looked at her. "How do we know for sure that you _are _Ryan? And if you are who you claim to be, how are you able to be back?"

The figure didn't answer at first but continued staring as though there was something about the girl that completely caught him off guard. Rika's eyes narrowed. "What?"

The specter stepped back with a nervous expression on his face. "Rika… um… your hair is down."

The girl looked perplexed for a minute and then realized that she hadn't put her hair back into its usual ponytail since she separated from Renamon. Rika growled. "You claim to come all the way back from the great beyond and that's the first thing you say to me?"

"Sorry. It's just one of those things where I always figured that I'd end up dying first before ever seeing. Kind of funny how things work out."

Chris burst out laughing before promptly falling into a coughing fit once Rika's glare turned on him.

"Oh, its him all right," said Chris trying to hide a grin. "Only he could tell jokes that bad. Speaking of which, don't you think that it's a little bit weird for you to be making death jokes at your own expense?"

"What can I say," said 'Ryan' shrugging. "It's a 'once in an after-life time experience'."

Chris's eyes narrowed. "Okay, seriously, cut that out."

"If you're really who you say you are," said Rika crossing her arms. "Then you should be able to tell us how we became friends."

"Okay," said 'Ryan'. "Will, Chris, and I were created alongside each other so our friendship was kind of _written_ into our characters and the same goes for each of our partners. Reno saved us from a deranged author by the name of Digidestined of Darkness, I don't know who the heck that kid with the tapirmon is…"

"The name's 'John'," said the 'kid' smiling. "Pleasure to meet you I'm sure, despite your situation."

The ghost boy smiled.

"And what about me?" Asked Rika, glaring heavily at him.

"I wouldn't call us 'friends', Rika. More like 'acquaintances'. As I recall we didn't hit it off very well the day we first met…"

"It was a misunderstanding!" The girl shouted at him, causing the spirit to take another step backwards.

"Misunderstanding? You punched me! Gave me quite the shiner too as I recall…"

"I remember that one," said Chris chuckling. "You never did talk about what happened that day. What was up?"

"She said something to me that I took the wrong way, and I said something back. Her fist found my face and my back found the floor. End of story."

William whistled. "You must have had a death wish." Ryan glared at him for his bad pun, but the boy ignored it. "What did you say to her?"

"I'd rather not say," said Ryan. "I'm afraid that Rika might try to kill my spirit too."

"Knowing her, she'd probably be able to do it," muttered Dagmon under his breath.

"Why don't you tell us, Ryan?" Asked William, grinning mischievously. "After all, we _do _have to make sure that you are who you say you are."

"Well…" Ryan began but was cut off by Rika.

"That won't be necessary. I believe him, but for the record I _did_ apologize to you for that."

Ryan glowered. "You told me to stop whining and then helped me up off the ground. I don't recall the word's _I'm sorry_ existing anywhere in that conversation."

"I'd hate to point this out," said Caramon from his spot on Chris's shoulder. "But helping you up from off the ground is about as close to an apology as anyone would get from the Digimon Queen."

"The least she could have done was offer an ice pack or something," Ryan grumbled. "That really hurt."

"Stop whining," said Rika.

_Whoa, déjà vu._

"Anyway," said Reno trying to change the subject. "Are you sure that you're dead? I mean, besides the ghostly appearance I didn't think that I'd see you back among the living again."

"Yeah," said Caramon. "Maybe Black Wargreymon's attack tore open a hole in the space-time continuum and you're talking to us telepathically from an alternate dimension."

"Hang on, I'll check," said Ryan. "Nope. Still dead." William slowly reached forward and like a curious child stuck his hand into Ryan's immaterial form and quickly pulled it back, making Ryan's form become a little foggy at first before settling back to normal.

"Brrrr… You're cold."

"Well, what did you expect?" Demanded Ryan as he glared at his friend. "I've got no blood circulation, and no body to speak of for the blood to flow through anyway. And don't do that again either. It feels weird."

"Sarrrr-eee!" Sulked William.

Behind them, a screen winked into existence and a voice boomed from it.

"Hey, Ryan! See that you've found your friends. Figured that your bond with them would help you find them."

"Who's the loud, obnoxious guy?" Asked Rika, frowning.

"Dunno," said Ryan. "Met him when I was in limbo. He was a disembodied voice there too. Said that he needed me for something and that's why I'm back."

"And that reason would be…?"

Ryan shrugged. "Not to sure about that one either. The last thing that I remember before coming here was that I had a Wargreymon's claw sticking through me, and I was seeing my life flash before my eyes. It was really weird."

"You seem to have bad luck with Wargreymons don't you?" Joked William.

"ANYWAY," boomed the voice. "I need you all to step through this link. There are some friends of mine that are in trouble and they need your help."

"Why should we?" Asked Rika. "We were already in the middle of something important!"

"Because our goals are one and the same," said the voice. "Reno knows what I'm talking about, don't you Reno?"

Reno's face paled, but he said nothing. The voice sighed.

"Look, if you want to stop the Lord of Fanatasy from taking over the FanFic Domain, then you'll have to step through this link. The lives of the Digi-destined, the other Tamers, and the Legendary Warriors are at stake here. All the seasons, all the stories are in danger. We're talking about the fate…"

"Yeah, yeah…" said William as he woke up Gaomon, who stared incredulously at Ryan but didn't faint this time. " '_We're talking about the fate of the world here,_' we know. We all saw that episode too. C'mone Betsy, we got a web site to save!" Picking up Gaomon William ran towards the portal, laughing like a maniac and passing through Ryan as he did so. Ryan glared daggers at the boy as he disappeared into the link.

"Jerk," he said. "I told him not to do that."

"Chris," said Rika. "Help me wake up Richoemon. He's coming along too."

"How? With Ryan dead and ghostly he's not going to be able to digivolve."

"We'll burn that bridge when we get there, now help me wake him up!"

"Rika," began Renamon.

"Don't worry," said Reno. "Dagmon and I will bring him through. No problem."

"You sure?" Asked Chris.

"Don't sweat it. Dag's pretty strong." As if on cue Dagmon lifted the stripy dinosaur onto his back and ran towards the portal, again passing through Ryan who bit back a curse. Reno gave Ryan a sympathetic smile before following after him, taking care _not_ to repeat his partner's mistake.

Rika looked at the portal, and then over at Renamon thoughtfully. "Something tells me that we're going to have to Biomerge before we follow those numbskulls." The kitsune nodded in agreement and Rika held up her D-Ark. A flash of light and a call of evolution later and the shaman digimon known as Sakuyamon stepped through the portal, and was quickly joined by a SkullMammothmon, the Biomerged form of John and Tapirmon.

Chris looked over at Ryan as Caramon hopped down from his shoulder.

"You ready?" He asked.

"Sure," replied Ryan and Caramon quickly digivolved to his ultimate level form of Metal Dracaramon. Chris hopped onto his partner's back and the three of them ran towards the portal.

"So what's it like being dead?" Asked Chris.

"Well," Ryan began. "For one thing I see dead people."

A/N-2: I feel that I probably could have done the part about Ryan's 'return' to his friends better, but seeing as how I haven't updated in a while (yeah, a few days absence qualifies as 'a while' for me) it's not so bad. Let me know what you think. R&R.

7


	18. Chapter 18

Disclaimer: The real challenge here is seeing how many different ways I can rephrase this disclaimer. And no, I don't own Digimon (sulks).

The Wages of Fans is Fiction: Chapter 18

Gatomon sighed in Veemon's embrace as they both watched the full moon rise in the sky. Everything seemed as it should be. Davis and Kari were out enjoying themselves, the digital world was at peace, and every major villain had been destroyed. All was right with the world. In fact, to borrow one of the feline's famous catchphrases, everything was purrrr-fect. Nothing could be better than spending the evening with the one you love.

"Veemon?" She purred to the blue dragon next to her.

"Yeah?"

"I'm glad that we were able to get out tonight. Being cooped up inside of Kari's apartment sometimes makes my ears twitch."

"I'm shorry to hear that," replied Veemon in his usual lisp that to Gatomon had been music to her ears from the moment he had emerged from underneath the digi-egg of Courage.

"Don't be," she said. "Otherwise I wouldn't have a reason to enjoy our little 'get-togethers'." She smiled when she saw Veemon adopt a confused look on his face. "Not that I wouldn't otherwise," Gatomon finished slyly. Veemon chuckled and drew the feisty feline warrior in for a kiss, both of them closing their eyes as they felt themselves drawn closer by a bond that couldn't accurately be described by any word created by humans or digimon. It was the right moment. The perfect moment.

Except for one thing.

"Ahem." That.

The sound of a throat clearing had the two fling apart with Veemon turning a dark purple as he blushed deeply, while Gatomon's fur hid her own embarrassment. The latter of the two glared evilly at the source of the interrupted moment.

"Sorry," said the stranger that stood behind them. It was a boy wearing a purple jacket and a gray t-shirt. He had a sarcastic grin plastered on his face that spoke of nothing but mirth at the scene that he had interrupted. He seemed totally relaxed in their presence, as though the thought of being near strange digital life forms was something that he was used to. "Hate to interrupt you two, but I do have a good reason for it."

"Huh?" Veemon blinked in confusion while Gatomon looked at the boy with a guarded expression. She didn't know who this kid was, how he got up here without her knowing, or how he could talk to them in so familiar a tone, but she was already sure that whatever he had to say she didn't want to hear it.

"C'mone Veemon," she said getting up. "Let's go." Veemon was about to follow when the boy spoke up again.

"I've come to talk to you about your partner's Davis and Kari." All right. That got their attention. Nothing can snag a digimon like the thought of their partner being in trouble.

"What do you mean?" Asked Veemon. "Is Davish in trouble?" Gatomon looked over at the azure lizard, unsure if she should allow this conversation to continue, but there was Kari's safety to think about.

The boy nodded at Veemon's question. "If you could just come with me…" He paused as an explosion destroyed the silence of the night. Gatomon and Veemon looked around worriedly, finding a plume of smoke off in the distance.

"Hmmm… it looks like the trouble's started a little early. Look, a lot has been going down lately, and I don't have time to explain it all to you, but believe me when I say that your friends _are _in danger. They'll need your help, and I can get you to them."

"How?" Asked Gatomon skeptically.

"With this," said the boy and with a gesture a screen of light came into existence. "Step into this, and you'll arrive where you are needed." Needing no more prompting Veemon leapt towards the screen with Gatomon making an attempt to stop him and failing. A second later the blue dragon disappeared. Gatomon looked from the screen to the boy and back, not liking this development at all, but feeling that she had no choice she soon followed after the one she loved. Once her tail disappeared into the portal, the screen winked out. Stuffing his hands into his pockets, the boy looked over in the direction of the smoke, hoping that everything that he had done so far didn't just fall apart all at once. He took a breath of the crisp night air and disappeared a second later.

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"TOGEMON DIGIVOLVE TOOO… LILLYMON!"

Emerging from the light of digivolution was a petite, fairy like digimon baring a great resemblance to a flower. Stepping out of the hole in the wall she took off to help the massive insect known as Kabuterimon as he battled the Ultimate level virus known as Lady Devimon. He was in sore need of a breather that would last long enough for him to digivolve to Ultimate to, but unfortunately for him Lady Devimon wasn't going to give him that chance.

"DARKNESS WAVE!" The evil virus cried as she sent out a wave of shadow and bats at the Champion, making him cry out in pain.

"FLOWER CANNON!" Called out Lillymon as she brought her hands together and they merged into a cannon with petals surrounding its mouth. She fired off a burst of energy that connected with Lady Devimon who, to her credit, shrugged the attack off. This might have had something to do with the fact that it was a data based attack against a virus. Either way, it did no harm to the demon and caught her attention at the same time.

Bad combination.

Forming her left hand into one long spike, Lady Devimon flew towards Lillymon at lightning speed. Lillymon just barely dodged the spike but wound up getting her neck caught in Lady Devimon's chains.

_This isn't good…_ Lillymon thought as she choked for air.

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Koji shook Izzy, trying to get his attention. The red haired young adult turned to the dark haired boy with a near blank expression on his face.

"Izzy!" Said Koji loudly. "My D-Tector! Where did you put it?" Izzy maintained that blank look on his face, as though he was unsure as to where he was or if even anything around him was at all happening. Koji shook him again. "Izzy! Stay with me here! I need to know what you guys did with my…" a hand touched his shoulder and Koji found himself looking at Mimi, who handed him his blue and white digivice.

"How…?"

Mimi smiled faintly. "You must have dropped it when you reverse digivolved or something. I found it lying next to you so I thought that I'd better hold onto it until you woke up. Plus, if Izzy ever saw it, nothing would have stopped him from taking it apart and learning all that he could about it." Koji smiled a bit at that and took back his D-Tector. He had just stood up when another figure made its way into the room and shifted form, becoming an oversized, dark colored teddy bear with blood-red eyes, a tattered orange cape, and a giant claw affixed to his left arm.

WaruMonzaemon looked over the children with supreme confidence as he advanced on them. One of them was holding up a device towards the ceiling with a cold, determined, almost calculating look in his eyes, but as WaruMonzaemon didn't see a digimon nearby he wasn't too concerned. But he was one of the two that he and Lady Devimon were sent to go after, both of whom were in the same room.

_Heh, heh,_ cackled the evil teddy in his mind. _Looks like I'll be able to get all the credit for this one._

"All right kiddies! Let's not make things difficult and have you all come outside with me. There's a nice man who's anxious to meet you, especially the computer nerd _Izzy_. So come on, and don't even think about doing anything. You wouldn't want to make me _angry_ would you?"

As if in answer the kid with the digivice raised began to glow as streams of data enveloped him. "EXECUTE! FUSION EVOLUTION!" He called out.

_Aw, nuts…_ WaruMonzaemon thought forlornly.

_-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------_

At the sound of the explosion Tai, Matt, Sora, Koromon, Metal Garurumon, and Biyomon suddenly found themselves looking for reasons to break the light speed barrier, the incident from earlier forgotten in the heat of the moment. They had no idea just what was happening, but all of a sudden the world just seemed to be losing its last marble.

"That sounded like it came from Izzy's place," shouted Tai. "We've gotta get there as quickly as possible!"

"You got an idea how?" Asked Sora. "And what are we going to do when we get there? Biyomon and Koromon are both spent! I don't think that there's going to be a whole lot that we can do." Tai felt his heart sink at Sora's voice. Strange emotions washed over him, emotions of love and loss, coupled with vague memories of another time. Another life. None of it made much sense to him, but it hurt him just the same. Forcing his voice to a neutral tone, Tai tried to reassure his 'fiancé'.

"We'll think of something Sora," he told her. "We have too." Sora looked at him skeptically.

"You feeling alright Tai?" _Well, of course he's not,_ she chided herself._ He just had his mind taken over and he tried to kill his best friend, how do you think he's going to feel?_

Before Tai could even answer Metal Garurumon pulled to a stop, and Tai nearly smashed into the large cyborg wolf.

"Matt!" He called out to the blonde haired adult sitting on top of the walking arsenal. "Everything alright up there?"

"Sorry," said a voice ahead of them, causing everyone to focus on its source. It was a boy wearing a purple jacket. "Everyone I run into seems to be needing an apology lately. Not that it matters right now. I know that you need to help your friends down there," he said cocking his head in the direction that they were headed. "And I know what's been going on around here. I can help you, believe it or not. Don't know how much or how well 'cause my power is limited in this story, but then that's why I made a supply pick up before I got here once I knew what I was up against." Reaching into his jacket, the boy pulled out a blue glowing orb of a type that the Digi-destined had seen before. The boy nodded. "A digi-core. You might want to steel yourselves for this one." With that said, the orb burst into a silver light that enveloped the Digi-destined and their parters. Biyomon and Koromon's eyes widened and involuntarily words erupted from their mouths.

"KOROMON WARP DIGIVOLVE TOOO…"

"BIYOMON WARP DIGIVOLVE TOOO…"

"WARGREYMON!"

"GARUDAMON!"

The light faded and the digimon stared at themselves in surprise, feeling rejuvenated from the power. In front of them the strange boy shrugged.

"Sorry Garudamon. I had hoped that you would digivolve to mega as well, but I guess that this author has forbidden that. The jerk. Anyway…" with a flurry of movement a large screen appeared before them. "If you go through this, you'll find your friends. Now hurry! I have to try and get the others. You'll need all the help that you can get!" With that said the boy began to fade.

"WAIT!" Called out Sora. "Who are you? Why are you helping us?"

"Introductions and explanations will have to wait until later…" said the boy as his voice trailed off and he faded from view entirely.

Matt and Tai, who had recently caught only a glimmer of the truth, remained speechless, and quickly motioned their partners to follow them through the shining screen. They were joined a second later by Sora and Garudamon. As soon as they passed through the screen vanished.

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The Lord of Fantasy was furious. Nothing was coming out the way that he hoped it would. And now another author was taking it in turn to upset things even more! He had hoped to eliminate Koji and get Izzy without too much fuss but things had now taken a turn for the worst. Already a fusion hybrid was literally kicking the stuffing out of his WaruMonzaemon, while Lady Devimon was squaring off against no longer just one but now _two_ Ultimates! With two megas and another ultimate on their way things were well on their way to becoming chaotic. Well, he could be chaotic too.

He would not lose this one. No matter what it took.

Focusing his energies, the Lord of Fantasy prepared to summon even more powerful digimon to his aid.

He knew just which ones to start with too.

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Wargreymon, Metal Garurumon, and Garudamon burst onto the scene ready to mix it up with whatever enemy was out there. Seeing Lady Devimon tangling with Lillymon and MegaKabuterimon, Metal Garurumon took off into the air. His targeting screen locked on to the evil virus when suddenly a warning blared on his sensors.

_An incoming attack!_ Swerving to the side Metal Garurumon just barely dodged twin blasts of energies and landed on the ground. Wargreymon was at his side a second later, and they both stared in aw at the sight in front of them. The Digi-destined that they were partnered with were no less surprised. _Freaked,_ would have been a better word for it actually. What they saw was something, no, _something's_ that they thought that they'd never see again.

One was mechanical and looked like it was made for war. _Massive_ easily said it all, though if you wanted to call it a walking tank that too would have been fine. Another, large and serpantine. The look in its eyes as it glared at them beneath a mask of Chrome Digizoid spoke of a gluttony and pride masked by pure wrath. Yet still another appeared to be a child's toy gone bad. It had a look on its face that was far from playful, or at least not the type of playfulness that anyone would have enjoyed. And the last, wearing a facemask that had the colors of a playing card with four swords strapped to its back, gave new life to any psychological ideas about _fear of clowns_.

"No way…" began Tai.

"The Dark Masters," finished Matt.

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A/N: I had originally intended for Biyomon to digivolve to Phoenixmon, but I decided against it. Mostly because I felt that it would seem a little cliché and expected so I decided to go with something different in order to spice up the story line a bit. Don't know if it was really necessary but there you have it! So, 'till next time folks!

6


	19. Chapter 19

Disclaimer: I think I'll go with the old standby for this one. I don't own Digimon.

The Wages of Fans is Fiction: Chapter 19

"FROZEN HUNTER!" Shouted Koji in the fusion form of Beowulfmon as his blade slashed towards the WaruMonzaemon, who just barely parried the attack with his Bear Claw. Unperturbed Beowulmon continued his attack, this time slashing off a portion of WaruMonzaemon's right arm, sending stuffing flying everywhere. Howling painfully, the Ultimate turned and ran. Master's wrath or not, there was no way he was going to stick around and take this kind of abuse! Beowulfmon watched as the pathetic excuse of a child's toy ran down the ruins of the hallway before turning back towards the Digi-destined.

"Thank you," said Mimi gratefully.

"Man," said Davis jealously. "If only I could do that! That was so _awesome_! I wish Veemon were here…"

A flash of light and a screen appeared next to him, sending a blue dragon with a v shaped mark on his forehead alongside a white cat with gloves and a ring on her tail tumbling to the floor.

_Speak of the devil…_

"Veemon!" Shouted Davis.

"Gatomon!" Followed up Kari.

Looking up the two digimon practically jumped into their partner's arms.

"Kari!" Said Gatomon excitedly.

"Gatomon, but how…?"

"I don't suppose that we can save the explanations for later can we?" Said Beowulfmon. "We have a fight on our hands." That didn't describe half of it, but then he didn't know that things were just about to take a turn for the worst. That was when another screen appeared and out stepped a boy in a purple jacket and a gray t-shirt. Beowulfmon's eyes narrowed as he looked at the boy carefully, and then his eyes widened.

"DEAN!" The Digi-destined looked at the Beowulfmon, wondering how he could know a kid who could just appear out of nowhere.

The boy looked over at Beowulfmon and smiled. "Hello Koji. I see that you've escaped the clutches of Pepper. How've you been?"

"Don't really have time for pleasantries Dean." The boy nodded.

"I know. I'm trying to get as many of the Digi-destined, Tamers, and Legendary Warriors here as fast as possible but that's proving… difficult. I'll need to resort to another method soon, but I can't do that right now. I'm here to provide some help."

"You're here to provide some help?" Asked Davis. "Cool! But… uh… how? Wait! Does that mean you can digivolve like the big blue guy here with the sword?"

"Of a sort. But I'm going to need your help too. I can't do this on my own, and I also know that given your partner's current level he's not going to be able to do much out there except serve as a distraction. Which is why I brought this." A sudden glow materialized before them and settled into the familiar shape of a digi-egg before floating over to Davis.

"Whoa, the digi-egg of Miracles…" said Davis in wonderment.

"How were you able to do that?" Asked Kari. The boy's smile broadened.

"Just a little something that I picked up while I was on my way here."

Davis ignored the exchange and looked down at Veemon. "Think you're up to it big guy?"

Veemon nodded before pumping both his fists into the air. "YEAH!"

"All right then. GOLDEN ARMOR ENERGIZE!" The digi-egg burst into light that enveloped Veemon.

"VEEMON, GOLDEN ARMOR DIGIVOLVE TOOO… MAGNAMON!"

Veemon's body lengthened, becoming the size of a human. Golden armor plates formed over his body as light radiated from him. Without wasting any time, the Golden Armor digimon leapt out of the ruined apartment, determined to lend his friends a hand.

"He always was one of my favorites," said Dean in awe over the digimon.

Kari looked over to Gatomon. "You ready to join in?"

"Do cat's scratch furniture?"

"Gatomon, I'm not even going to answer that…" Kari said as she pulled out her digivice. A glow erupted from its screen, and cascaded over Gatomon.

"GATOMON DIGIVOLVE TOOO… ANGEWOMON!" Flying out to join the battle, Angewomon noted to her dismay that more digimon seemed to have joined the party. Looking at them she frowned beneath her helmet.

_Those look like the Dark Masters. But… that's imposs…_ "UH!" Angewomon was sent flying by a kick to the back by a familiar gothic looking digimon that she could have sworn that she destroyed twice.

"Sorry Blondie," LadyDevimon mocked.

_Jeez, it's like episode 50 from season one all over again,_ thought Koji as he leapt up into the air, determined to join the fight. In the meantime, Angewomon and LadyDevimon were now engaged in an all-out brawl that left Magnamon, MegaKabuterimon, and Lillymon watching in stunned amazement as the two exchanged everything from arrows and bats to vicious fist cuffs.

"Whoa," said Magnamon sweat dropping.

"Um… shouldn't we be doing something?" Asked Lillymon blinking at the sight in front of them.

"No," said MegaKabuterimon. "This is kind of personal for them. We'll step in if things get out of hand." Having been there for their first encounter, the massive insect digimon knew perfectly well what he was talking about. As he finished that sentence, Beowulfmon lunged at LadyDevimon, swiping his blade down in an arching slash that she easily deflected, and soon slapped him aside like a rag doll before returning to her fight with Angewomon.

Magnamon followed the hybrid's course towards the ground when suddenly he saw something that caught his attention. _That looks like Wargreymon and Metal Garurumon. But who are they fighting?_

"Guys? Care to explain what's going on over there?" Following Magnamon's sight, the two Ultimates froze.

"Rrrrrgh. It's the Dark Masters," Growled Mega Kabuterimon.

"How come we never get the easy ones?" Said Lillymon in a low voice, unaware that somewhere nearby someone was saying the exact same thing.

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Ryan took a look at the situation as soon as he, Chris, and Metal Dracaramon exited the screen. _Let's see… Four Dark Masters and what looks like one LadyDevimon…_Ryan groaned. "How come we never get the easy ones?" Chris looked at Ryan weird as he climbed down from his partner.

"Is that like your trademark line or something? I recall you using it a lot while we were in our fic."

"Hey," said Ryan. "Every Terriermon has their _momentai_. So leave me alone."

"Whatever," said Chris. "But it does fit in either case. Four Megas at once, and we have only two as near as we can tell, unless Reno here can pull a rabbit trick out of his hat to…"

"I'll work on it," said Reno darkly.

"Okay," said Chris. "We'll let him work on it. In the meantime, what're we going to do?" All eyes turned to Sakuyamon and SkullMammothmon.

"I take it you guys are banking on me and the _Elephant's Graveyard_ here to save the day?" Sakuyamon asked in Rika's voice.

"Well," said SkullMammothmon in John's voice. "We are uniquely qualified for the job."

Sakuyamon sighed and leapt into the air. "You guys just stay here and try to keep out of trouble."

"Wha…? Stay here?" Asked Chris. "Are you kidding me? Okay, sure it looks like the Dark Masters are fighting someone but…"

"Save your breath kid," said SkullMammothmon. "You're way out of your league here and you'd only get in the way." With that said the giant digimon lumbered off into battle. Ryan looked at Chris.

"They're right you know. Two Ultimates, two rookies, and a dead guy. I don't think that we can do much."

"Since when did you become such a defeatist?" Asked Chris.

"I'm not. I never said that we should just sit here, just that they were right. What we _can_ do is intervene at the right moments in order to give them an edge."

"Us, you mean right?" Asked William. "Don't forget, you said so yourself that you're a dead guy."

"Thanks ever so much for reminding me of that, Will."

"No problem. I think that it might make for a pretty good epitaph for you."

"You're a riot, Will. By the way, ever hear of the saying _silent as the grave_?"

"Would you two just knock it off," said Reno. "I don't know about you guys but I'm not sticking around here to watch these guys slug it out with each other. Dag?"

"I'm with you, Reno!"

A flash of digivolution later, and soon Dagmon's Ultimate form of MetalLunasmon was charging into battle with Reno following right behind him. Chris watched his back for a moment before turning to his friends and saluting.

"If I'm not back in," Chris paused to take another look at the battle. "One hour," another look. "Maybe two," Another look. "Aw heck make it three, call the Rescue Rangers."

Ryan, William, and Gaomon sweatdropped. Well, William and Gaomon did.

"Somehow," said Gaomon. "I think this is out of the league of a group of chipmunks and mice that have an overabundant sense of adventure."

"Whatever," said Chris as he motioned for Metal Dracaramon to follow him into battle. Ryan and William watched.

"Well," said Ryan. "I don't know what I can do, but I'll be rolling in my grave the day I sit on the sidelines."

"Did anyone ever tell you that you're lousy when it comes to making jokes?"

"From everyone. All the time. Like it stops me though." And with that Ryan dashed off into the battle.

William was actually considering following their lead when a voice spoke up from behind him.

"I thought I just saw Ryan running towards a fight. And I could see through him." Will and Gaomon both sweat dropped at a now awake Richoemon. Gaomon looked up at his partner.

"You've got this one, dude."

"Thanks, Bruce."

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"METAL FANG!" Shouted Metal Garurumon as he snapped at Piedmon, only to be nailed a second later by a Giga Cannon attack that had been thrown wild by a large elephant smashing into Machindramon. Unintentional or not, it certainly gave the evil clown the chance that he needed to make an attack. Laughing like the lunatic that he is, Peidmon brought his trump swords down towards Metal Garurumon's head.

Only to be stopped by a bronze staff with a ring on one end.

"SPIRIT STRIKE!" Shouted Sakuyamon, and immediately four mystical fox spirits appeared and dove at Peidmon, forcing him to fall back screaming.

"You all right?" Sakuyamon asked Metal Garurumon as the Mega wolf cyborg stood up.

"I am now," said Metal Garurumon, wondering what was up with that double voice thing that his savior had going. Shrugging it aside Metal Garurumon and Sakuyamon leapt forward, summoning their attacks as Peidmon did likewise.

"TRUMP SWORDS!"

"AMETHYST WIND!"

"METAL WOLF CLAW!"

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"MAGNA BLAST!" Shouted Magnamon as energy bursts shot out from his armor, smashing dead on with Machinedramon. His attack was backed up by SkullMammothmon's Spiral Bone Crusher, and while their attacks did much to harm the destructive Dark Master, he simply shrugged it off and closed the distance between him and SkullMammothmon.

"DRAGON FIRE!" Shouted Machinedramon as he smashed his claw into the Mega vaccine, forcing him to the ground. Magnamon flew forward. Even though he didn't know why this digimon was here helping him and his friends, he _did_ know that he was helping, and in that light Magnamon was determined to help him in turn.

Like the old saying goes, _the enemy of my enemy is my friend._

"MAGNA KICK!" Shouted Magnamon as Machinedramon turned towards him.

"GIGA CANNON!"

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"RIVER OF POWER!" Shouted Metal Seadramon as he blasted a beam of pure energy at Wargreymon, who artfully dodged the attack and went in close to slash at his serpentine foe.

"Seems to me that you really need to blow your nose," Wargreymon taunted as his Dramon Destroyers tore into Metal Seadramon's armor.

"RAAAARGH!" Screamed the Lord of the Oceans in rage and pain as he tried to encircle the Mega warrior.

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"HORN BUSTER!"

"FLOWER CANNON!"

The two Ultimate level attacks crashed into each other, canceling out. Puppetmon laughed as he twisted the wires that held Lillymon and MegaKabuterimon under his control, having a grand old time doing it. He was having fun watching the two friends battle it out with each other. They weren't using their attacks at full strength yet because Puppetmon wanted to enjoy the show that they could give him. However, Puppetmon also happens to have a very low boredom threshold so it was simply a matter of time before that changed.

"ARSENAL BARRAGE!"

"SHADOW MORTOR!"

That sure was fast wasn't it?

A rain of missiles crashed into Puppetmon and was swiftly followed by a energy sphere as dark as midnight. Puppetmon screamed in frustration and jumped up into the air, bringing his hammer to bare and firing a stream of energy bullets from it.

"PUPPET PUMMEL!" He shouted as the attacks hit home. The two digimon fell to the ground, but refused to reverse digivolve. Puppetmon landed and glared at them.

"So you wanna play rough do ya? Fine, we'll play…" Puppetmon ran forward with his hammer, and struck the two digimon hard, sending them both flying. MetalLunasmon struggled to his feet. Behind him, a figure approached.

"I'm sick of having to deal with guys like you," the figure said. "You all think that this is just a game, and that you can do whatever you want with us. All some of us want to do is live our lives but we can never do that with psychos like you around."

_Very dramatic Reno,_ thought MetalLunasmon. _If this was a fic that would have made a very good line. Too bad that this isn't a fic._

Reno continued on. "Well I'm telling you that it stops right here! I'll make sure that villains like you never harm a single innocent again! I won't let you! I WON'T ALLOW IT!" A glow erupted from the device attached to the boy's arm and a cold mechanical voice spoke from it.

"BIOMERGE DIGIVOLUTION!"

Puppetmon shielded his eyes from the light that enveloped both Tamer and Digimon.

"METALLUNASMON BIOMERGE TOOO… SABREMON!"

The light died down, and the digimon known as MetalLunasmon was replaced by a dark knight digimon. On his left arm was a shield with notches covering the outer edge, the symbol of fate emblazoned on its center. Black Wings extended from his back, and in his right hand was a sword, blade black as midnight. Extending the blade towards his foe, Sabremon spoke in a voice that held no mercy for his enemy.

"Prepare to be judged," he said icily, wisps of cold air escaping from his face guard.

"What is it with you Digi-destined and the warrior look?" Asked Puppetmon sarcastically as he charged forward.

A/N: I wanted to make this chapter longer, but I decided that I should post something as a New Years gift to all of you readers out there. The next chapter is guaranteed to have action in it, and will begin the countdown towards the end of this fic. (sniff) I'm going to be a bit sad when it ends, I've really enjoyed working on it so far. It's been fun. Oh well. I'd like to take these last few notes of the year to give out a special thanks to Tshk, Dag 417, Kouichi's Girl, Sushimonster724, Gigawolf1, CrestOfHealing, FluffyShrekGirl, and Digital-Dragon-Master for taking the time to read and review my story. Thanks you guys! Happy New Years! See you all in 2007! WAHOOO: D

7


	20. Chapter 20

Disclaimer: Because I don't own Digimon, I am required to say that I don't before writing this fic, lest I be sued. Therefore, I don't own Digimon, so there.

The Wages of Fans is Fiction: Chapter 20

Beowulfmon fell towards the streets, completely helpless against the forces of gravity that propelled him towards the concrete below. Or at least that's what he thought. A dark shadow flashed across his vision, and suddenly his path reversed direction and he was sent careening through an apartment window.

"You just can't seem to stay out of trouble can you Koji?" Laughed a voice that was very, very familiar to the blue colored Legendary Warrior. Looking up, his eyes fell upon a dark colored figure with wearing what looked like a lion like mask, with a similar image emblazoned on his chest and shoulders. It was the Legendary Warrior known as Loewemon, or better known to Koji as…

"KOICHI! What are you doing here?"

The boy smiled beneath his mask. "Saving you by the looks of things. I know that you normally want to protect me, but can't a brother do the same for his sibling? Or would you rather go splat on the ground that you were falling towards?"

Koji gave a small laugh. His brother did have a point there. "Well, thanks. But you still didn't answer my question."

"Takuya called me when he couldn't get a hold of you, said something about you leaving a message. I found the last author that you were working with at the time and he said that you took off. When I heard that there was some 'trouble' going on in Odaiba I figured that you'd be involved, so here we are." Koichi frowned as he looked around the apartment that they were in. "Hmmm… I wonder why the occupants haven't come barging in yelling at us."

"Never mind, they probably took off after the commotion started. But we'd better get in there quickly. Last I saw the Dark Masters were owning Wargreymon and Metal Garurumon. Are the other Legendary Warriors here? I have a feeling that we're going to be needing Susanoomon."

Koichi frowned. "Sorry to say, but no they're not. They're currently being held up. Something to do with the transportation going haywire or something. The Fanfic Express is not taking any trips to this area for some reason, and all workable Web Links are being used by one source apparently. Zoe's probably taking the opportunity to just fly here though…"

"Nevermind. We'd better jump in there and try to help out as much as we can until reinforcements get here. From everything that I've been told, those Dark Masters are tough!"

_No kidding,_ thought Koichi as the two of them leapt out of the hole in the building, just in time to avoid a stray Giga Cannon blast.

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As the battle raged, three Log In portals appeared, and from them emerged three authors that Koji would have recognized had he seen them. One was the very definition of darkness with the absence of light as not a single feature was shown on his form that so greatly resembled a Devimon. Space warped about him in ways that disturbed the mind and tricked the eyes if you looked too long at it. Another resembled a cross between a samurai and a warrior, and carried an obscenely large sword that should have been impossible for one of his size to carry, let alone wield properly. And the last was a boy in a dark trench coat. They surveyed the scene with the attention of experienced generals before charging into battle, each going their own way.

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Magnamon had avoided the first couple blasts by ditching his planned attack on Machinedramon, but the cybernetic war machine was firing at a rate too quickly for him too keep up and soon Magnamon was hit again and again before finally being thrown into the building that had been Izzy's abode. Fortunately for him, he did not reverse digivolve, and fortunately for his fox-hole buddy, the Skull Mammothmon, the distraction had given him ample time to push Machinedramon off of him and fire a Spiral Bone Crusher attack at point blank range, severely damaging the evil machine, but still not deleting him. As Magnamon got up and prepared to jump back into the battle he was slammed to the ground hard. Looking up he saw a digimon that he didn't recognize. A warrior looking digimon.

"My, what a big sword you have there, grandma," said Magnamon sarcastically as he rolled out of the way of the oncoming onslaught. The massive sword smashed into the ground, splitting the sidewalk in two. Magnamon used the momentum from his role to get back to his feet in record time and rush forward with a fist pulled back.

"MAGNA PUNCH!" He shouted. Turning on a dime, the new enemy whirled his sword around and smashed it into Magnamon's chest plate, sending him sprawling to the ground.

_That hurt,_ thought Magnamon as he brought his arm guards up in time to deflect another sword slash aimed at his body. _This isn't going to be easy…_

_-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------_

Koichi rolled on the ground and came up in an attack stance, raising his staff in a defensive posture, pausing as he saw a shadowy figure approach him. At first glance he thought that it was a Devimon, but quickly realized his mistake when he couldn't make out any other features on the creature. Not being a digimon that he could recognize, and taking into account all the heavy levels of weirdness that was going on lately, he was suddenly sure that it was an author. He decided to test his theory.

"Don't you have a story to be writing or something?"

The figure chuckled, its voice scraping like nails on a chalkboard, making Koichi wince at the sound of it. "Keep talking. It'll make it all the more sweet when I destroy you."

_Is there any cliché line that these guys won't use when they go into 'bad guy' mode?_ Koichi wondered. "What's your problem anyway? Why are you so intent on wailing the tar out of us? And why are you siding with the Lord of Fantasy anyway? You _have _to know that he's just going to backstab you in the end."

"Say it if it makes you feel any better. I on the other hand know that he won't betray me. The great Lord and I share similar… _tastes_." Koichi shivered at that. The shadowy figure regarded him. "You know… I wonder… tell me bearer of Darkness, do you have what it takes to live up to the title that destiny has bestowed upon you?"

Koichi raised his staff. "More than enough to deal with punks like you."

"We shall see," said the dark author, and the two leapt at each other.

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"AMETHYST WIND!"

"METAL WOLF CLAW!"

The combined attacks of Sakuyamon and Metal Garurumon quickly overpowered Piedmon, and he collapsed to the ground. He was down, but not out though. In a second he'd be back on his feet and launching another attack at them, but Sakuyamon wasn't going to give him that one-second that he needed.

She wouldn't allow it.

But neither would another soon to be enemy.

As Sakuyamon was powering up for an Amethyst Mandala attack, she was suddenly kicked to the side by a boy in a trenchcoat. Metal Garurumon leapt to her aid, only to be struck by Peidmon's Clown Trick a second later, enabling the kid to latch onto him and throw the robotic wolf onto the ground, hard.

"Bad doggy," the boy mocked. "No biscuit." Metal Garurumon whimpered slightly, though more from pain than any false promise of a treat after the fight. The boy smirked at Peidmon, and then was cracked viscously in the head by a familiar bronze staff. Growling angrily, the boy in the trench coat leapt at Sakuyamon, blocking another swipe from her staff, punching the biomerged Mega to the ground and trying to get a stranglehold on her. Metal Garurumon got up, but soon found his hands… paws… full with having to deal with Peidmon and his Trump Swords.

"It's just you and me now," said Peidmon, grinning like a lunatic.

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The author laughed maniacally as he gripped Sakuyamon's throat. She was struggling fiercly, but the author was apparently in a class all by himself. If she had a moment to breath and concentrate long enough to launch an attack than she could easily send this guy crying to his mother, but the stupid kid wasn't giving her the moment that she needed. The world seemed to swim before her eyes and began to grow foggy.

_RIKA!_ Shouted Renamon in the girl's mind. _NO! DON'T GIVE U…_Renamon suddenly halted in her cry, but it was not because of Rika passing out from lack of oxygen, because that wasn't the case.

"Wha…?" Both Renamon's and Rika's voices emerged from Sakuyamon's lips as they took note of an unusual occurrence that the author had also noticed. Something that also made the author loosen his grip around her throat. From their perspective there seemed to be a hand, an immaterial hand sticking out of the author's chest. As the author in the trench coat's eyes widened in shock the fingers on that hand wiggled, and then almost seemed to wave at Sakuyamon before giving her the thumbs up. Whirling about in shock, the author struck out, determined to dispatch the disturbing offender, only to find his fist pass right through him.

_Ryan? _Thought Rika angrily. _What's he doing here? I thought I told him to… Oh, never mind! Renamon? You ready?_

The sound of a light chuckle echoed through the girl's mind. _Always, Rika._

Able to breath again, Sakuyamon summoned her strength and attacked.

"What the…?" Began the author as his fist sailed right through the specter, not harming it a bit before realizing what he just did.

"Oh, shi…" He never got to finish his sentence, and the air around him burned with violet light as he logged out.

"AMETHYST MANDALA!"

Sakuyamon glared angrily at the ghost of Ryan. "What're you doing here?" She growled.

The ghost heaved a sigh. "You're welcome, Sakuyamon."

"I thought I told you and the rest of the goof troop to _stay behind_."

"Hey, it looked like you were in trouble so I decided to lend a hand. As per your orders, I like to think that I observed the _spirit_ of the law, and not the letter."

Inside her blue sphere of data, Rika growled at the boy, who, knowing that he was currently beyond her threats of intended violence, simply grinned. Lightly. A thought occurred to the girl.

"If you're here, then where... oh no... don't tell me that the others have decided to jump ship too in order fight the sharks."

Ryan shifted uneasily. "Okay, I won't tell you."

Sakuyamon was about to launch into a series of expletives that would make the dead sit up and take notice, when suddenly, without warning, Sakuyamon leapt forward, passing through the ghost of a boy, summoning a shield against what looked like another one of Machinedramon's Giga Cannon attacks gone wild, and shouting at him to get down.

_Since when does being dead suddenly become an open invitation for everyone to walk through you?_ Thought Ryan irritably.

With an effort, Sakuyamon pushed back the attack and turned back to him.

"You all right?" She asked in her dual voice of Rika and Renamon. Ryan looked at her in surprise. Had he been able to, he would've sweat dropped.

"Um… not to sound ungrateful or anything, but you do realize that you just risked your life to save me?"

"What're you getting at?" Sakuyamon asked crossly.

"Just that I'm already dead."

Sakuyamon's mouth twitched. "Oh. Right."

"When this is over, remind me to nominate you for the _'Most Goggleheaded Move of the Year' _Award."

Sakuyamon growled at him before leaping up into the air, gracefully dodging another errant Giga Cannon blast as it sailed by her and impacted the ground where Ryan stood. As the dust settled, Ryan's eyes went from one of surprise to anger as he glared fiercely at the Mega level Shaman as she flew off to help Metal Garurumon.

"REAL MATURE, SAKUYAMON!"

Sakuyamon could be heard laughing in her dual voice over the sound of battle.

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The reason why those Giga Cannon blasts were sent wild could be traced to the reaction of one SkullMammothmon as he was being pressed down by Machinedramon with no help coming from any corner at the moment, everyone being to wrapped up in their own personal battles to think of lending a hand. SkullMammothmon's eyes lighted on Sakuyamon as the author proceeded to pummel her, and a flame flared in the heart of the Tamer known as John. For reasons that he had yet to understand, the idea of Sakuyamon… Renamon… being treated that way enraged him beyond all reason, and with a renewed strength he began to push Machinedramon off of him, but the going was too slow. _Too slow!_ He needed more power!

_Renamon! NO! I won't let you be destroyed! I won't fail you! I WON'T!_

A light erupted from within his core and spread outwards, engulfing him as Machinedramon powered up his Giga Cannons for a point blank attack, only to be shoved off suddenly as he fired off two separate rounds, away from SkullMammothmon. As the Mega level vaccine got to his feet, the light intensified, and involuntarily words came to his lips.

"SKULLMAMMOTHMON! MODE CHANGE TOOO…"

"SKULLMAMMOTHMON! GUARDIAN MODE!"

SkullMammothmon reared up onto his hind legs as they lengthened, and his bones composition shifted to that of Chrome Digizoid. Armor appeared on his torso, and his tusks adopted a razor's edge to them that glinted in the light nastily. His forward legs became arms, and golden wristbands appeared with digi-code emblazoned on them. Towering over Machinedramon, the new form of SkullMammothmon roared and charged, the earth shaking beneath his feet, and a LadyDevimon crashed to the pavement shortly thereafter, dissolving into scraps of data as she screamed.

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Smoke billowed up from the scene of battle, clouding over the light of the full moon that shone over the city of Odaiba, enshrouding it in darkness. Out of that darkness, twin light suddenly shone that was almost as the birth of two dawns, and Metal Seadramon was forced to swallow Wargreymon's Terra Force attack while Magnamon sent another author out of his account. The lights died down, and after a feeble cry of _Trump Swords_ followed by yet another scream of pain, all became quiet.

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Koji walked over to his brother tired and sore, Koichi as he sat on the ground with a content look on his face.

"Hey," he said. "You alright?"

Koichi turned and smiled at his twin. "Let's just say that the _Lord of Darkness_ keeps his title after all."

Koji raised an eyebrow at him.

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Reno separated from Dagmon and opened his eyes as Puppetmon's data floated away freely into the air, with nothing to anchor it anymore. Activating his D-Comp, Reno pulled the data into his digivice and smirked.

"Told ya, I'd make kindling out of you," he said as he patted Dagmon's head.

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John ran over to Renamon as soon as he separated from Tapirmon and, much to everyone's surprise, Renamon included, embraced the vulpine digimon in a hug that suggested that it would take an awful lot just to make him let go of her again, and from the look of things, despite her own surprise at the gesture, Renamon returned it gratefully. Caramon from his spot on Chris's shoulder surveyed this scene with great interest.

"Well, well, well…" he said with a raised eye. "What do we have here? You should know John that, according to the _Who's Who in Fan Fics_ magazine, Renamon's got a boyfriend already. I don't think that he's going to take to well to you…"

"Would you shut up, you little lizard?" Growled Rika angrily. "John _is_ Renamon's boyfriend!"

At this news there was quite an audible number of gasps, and a shout of exclamation from William a second later.

"NO WAY! THAT WAS YOU?"

John, whose face was already deep red from having the news spilled before he had been ready, flushed even more and just nodded numbly. William pumped his fist in victory.

"Yeesssss! You go, dude! Man, I can't wait to tell the tabloids about this!"

Ryan, who was standing next to the boy, made an attempt to smack William upside the head for his inappropriateness, only to find his hand passing through the boy instead of the satisfying sound of impact that he had been expecting. Frowning slightly at his hand, the boy pitched a sigh and looked over at a certain red-haired Tamer.

"Rika? Do you mind?"

The girl cracked her knuckles as she approached the red-haired boy, who still seemed oblivious to what was about to happen to him.

"With pleasure," Rika said evilly. William's peripheral vision suddenly caught the girl approaching him.

"Hey. What's she doi…?"

POW!

"Well," said Ryan a second later. "That was a little extreme."

Chris just burst out laughing.

7


	21. Chapter 21

Disclaimer: Once more folks… I do not own Digimon or their respective characters.

The Wages of Fans is Fiction: Chapter 21

The Lord of Fantasy howled with rage and shoved the keyboard away from him. Once again things had not gone the way that he envisioned them. Once again the story had turned away from his devices, serving the ends of another instead of him. A red curtain fell over his vision and for a time the author remained mute towards the world, his chest rising up and down heavily as breath exited flaring nostrils like the fires of a dragon.

_How could this happen,_ the boy wondered after some time had passed. _Despite everything I do, the story resists me. Characters not only from other seasons keep intruding on it, but so do characters that have no right to even exist! I can't even count on OC's to stay dead and not find a way to affect things! I had everything going for me, knowledge, control of the FanFic Domain's main server, the ability to lock authors out of their accounts… well, some of them anyway…_

The author frowned, feeling like a villain from the Digimon show, wondering if this is what they felt each time the characters balked one of their plans. He wondered how it was that the author Dean had been able to escape the lockdown. Calling up the author's profile he got his answer.

_Of course, he's a Savers specialist. I never expected trouble from anyone who did not work with Season's one and two, and now he's got some way to keep me from locking him out of his account._

The Lord of Fantasy sat back in his chair and thought on past events for a bit before looking at his alarm clock and noting the time. It was late, and he had been writing all day. His creative energies were now nearly exhausted, but he still had enough left for one last brainstorm.

_Yes,_ he thought._ There is something that I can do to make the Digimon universe mine, and eliminate not only the OC's, but _all _my rivals in the field. I'll be needing some rest before I put this plan into motion, but I can't leave my hold over the Domain server unprotected._

Smiling, he pulled up the profiles of seven digimon and after quickly writing them in, he instructed them to protect his gains, before logging out of his account and turning off his computer. As he climbed into bed, he felt a new confidence burn in his heart. Tomorrow, he would show everyone why he was called… the Lord of Fantasy.

A/N: Sorry that this chapter is a little short, but I wanted to spend some time working on my other works and setting the stage for the last few chapters of this story (you may be surprised as to what the Lord of Fantasy has in store for everyone. If not, feel free to flame away. I could use them for inspiration or for the Lord's special attacks if he ever decides to take center stage). Plus I wanted to load something tonight anyway, this time from the perspective of the author (I might be doing some more of that in the future. Wonder how much mileage I can get out of that). If anyone's still interested in tossing in an OC for this fic, now's the time to do it, seeing as how the final charge is about to be made (even if it's an author's Avatar or something like that. Muscle is going to be needed for the coming battle. Won't be much room for character development though, which makes me a bit sad. I love character development). If your character doesn't make a debut, don't blame me. My e-mails being weird for some reason.

Anyway, read, review, peace, etc… etc…

'Till next time then.

-Crazyeight

2


	22. Chapter 22

A/N: …Okay… _now _my e-mail's up again (just now I'm getting updates from stuff that was done two weeks ago. Grrr…).

Disclaimer: Me? Own Digimon? That's a laugh! Though I wish…

The Wages of Fans is Fiction: Chapter 22

Chris looked up at the smoke filled sky, his eyes gazing at the full moon that hung among the stars, it's light dulled and yet made more majestic and mysterious by the smoke that billowed up from the devastation around him. Reno and Dagmon came up to his side and joined him in his private sojourn. They stayed silent for a few minutes before Chris spoke.

"Is it just me, or does it seem like that there's always a full moon around here at night?"

Reno looked at the blonde haired boy with a confused expression.

"I mean it," said Chris. "I don't think that I've ever seen the moon go through its lunar cycle since I became part of the Digimon Fanfic community."

Reno thought about it for a minute. "I'm sure that it's just you. Otherwise the others would have noticed long before now. Why do you ask?"

Chris shrugged. "Call it frank curiosity. I was just wondering. So, what's going on?"

"The others are trying to help Mimi, Izzy, Davis, and Kari out of the apartment. Mimi's spazzing out over it, though not in the way she normally would. It looks like she's more worried about how Izzy's holding up. He looks pretty out of it"

Chris nodded. "And how're the other Digi-destined holding up since we got here?"

"Well, they've decided to hold off on questions until everyone's safe and sound, but I think that they're a little uncomfortable with the situation, which is understandable given that Rika has yet to learn the meaning of the word _tact_. Something that I would've expected from Terriermon…"

"She's not hurting anyone is she?"

"Does _brow beating_ count as hurting?"

"Depends. Is it physical or verbal?"

"Verbal with the threat of physical."

Chris groaned. "You'd think that after everything she went through in season three she would show a little more restraint. Honestly, we just can't take her _anywhere_. Now I know why she and her doubles aren't allowed to be in the same room together…"

"Maybe we should have Ryan be the referee for them. After all, he's the only one that she can't hurt anymore."

Chris snorted. "Yeah, but he can't do anything to restrain her either. What's he going to do? Shout _boo_? At best she'll just laugh at him and at worst she'll call in an exorcist. Besides, Ryan's got enough on his plate explaining to his partner Richoemon about how he's a ghost now."

"I see," said Reno. "Is that hard to do?"

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"You're… a ghost?" Asked Richoemon as he cocked his head in confusion. "So how come you don't look like the Pillsbury Doe Boy?"

Ryan hung his head and sighed. "Let's start over…"

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From his spot on Chris's shoulder, Caramon chuckled. "Obviously, you don't know Richoemon all that well."

"That's 'cause I don't."

Caramon just shrugged and smirked, as though he knew a secret. Reno and Dagmon both looked at each other.

_Oookaaay…_

"Don't mind Caramon. He's just being… himself. Anyway, we should probably get in there and see if they need any help. By the way, I wanted to ask you about that voice from the computer screen that sent us here. That was 'Dean' right? The author who hired you and rescued us from Black Wargreymon?"

"Yeah," said Reno. "What about it?"

"I'm just thinking that we may want to expect a visit from him again real soon."

"That goes without saying," said Reno.

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Mimi held onto Izzy's hand as she helped him climb down the shattered stairwell. She was worried about him. Very worried. He hadn't said a word since the fight started, and he kept looking at her as though she were some sort of stranger, although he blushed occasionally when he looked at her hand wrapped around his. But mostly, he looked lost, and that was not something that belonged on Izzy Izumi. He always had the look of curiosity, and even when he was under fire he would be asking questions, and would no doubt continue to ask questions on his deathbed. To be like this was unnatural, and it rightly made Mimi nervous.

"HEY!" Shouted a cranky sounding voice from down the hall. It belonged to a red-haired girl wearing a t-shirt with a heart imprinted on it. "BARBIE GIRL! Get a move on, none of us are getting any younger!"

Mimi scowled. What was her name again? Rika? That was it. The girl grated on her nerves a bit, but somehow Mimi felt that it was something that wasn't entirely intended on the other's part, and was something that she herself was long used to. She didn't know why that was though, but that feeling, that sense of familiarity made her bite back a sarcastic reply, and giving Izzy's hand a squeeze (causing another round of blushing on his part), they continued to make their way down towards the streets.

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John was fuming. No, fuming didn't quite describe it. As of right now, his emotions consisted of the urge to give a blood-curdling scream and destroy everything around him in a blind fit of rage. As he stared at the site in front of him, a vein throbbed on his forehead as his face went through three different shades of red and the air around him assumed a 'warped' appearance from the heat that was emanating from his body. Next to him, Rika and Renamon looked at him curiously before following his gaze.

Now it's been stated before that all authors have their preferences when it comes to couplings, and even though John had long ago divorced himself from all coupling conflicts he still had his own preferences; preferences that lay hidden and, for the most part, dormant in the deepest recesses of his subconscious. What was the cause of his anger had to be, in his opinion, the one thing that violated anything and everything that he held sacred in this life and the next. It was horrendous, it was unspeakable, and he couldn't even say its name out loud for fear of being struck by lightning for his profanity.

Let's be brief shall we?

The cause of his anger was the sight of Davis and Kari holding hands as they exited the building.

_Stay calm; stay calm,_ John thought, trying desperately to hold on to whatever sense of self-restraint that he had left. He had to remind himself that this time it wasn't precisely their choice. That they had their minds brainwashed and the entire script of the show re-written to suit someone else's desires over what was already set in stone. It was hard though, so very hard. Shakily taking a deep breath, John closed his eyes and counted to three before reopening them, grimacing as he saw Kari stumble over a piece of rubble, catching herself on Davis's arm and placing a hand on one of his thighs (causing the goggle wearing boy to blush deeply and look up at the sky as he sweat dropped). Fighting off the sudden urge to go find himself a shotgun John steeled himself for the long night ahead of him.

_Hey, the Digi-destined had it way harder than you ever did. Writing blocks? Please! That's nothing compared to facing down a Monochromon or MaloMyotismon. If they could face all that without cracking than I can stand this too!_

_…Though if Gatomon and Veemon were to show up holding hands also…_

Well, we already know about that don't we?

Groaning in frustration, John followed the pair out of the building with Renamon looking at him worriedly as he did so.

_What's wrong with him?_ Wondered the vulpine digimon as she eyed the boy.

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The group of children and digimon had no sooner gotten together in one spot when a pink screen flashed into existence and deposited a boy roughly around the age of fifteen in a purple jacket before them. A boy that was, for a number of the children and partners, was immediately recognizable.

"Hey Dean," said Reno as he approached the boy.

"Reno. Glad to see that you're all right, and that the battle has gone well for you guys. Sorry that I couldn't participate more directly myself, but I… ah… had to take out the garbage for my Mom. You know how it is."

The Digi-Destined had no idea what was going on with this exchange. Not that it mattered at the moment, as one person with a clearer understanding of the situation decided to criticize the boy's sense of decision making.

"You're saying that the whole FanFic Domain was going down the tubes and the biggest thing on your worry list was having to do chores?" Scoffed the redheaded Tamer known as Rika Nonaka. "You really need to get your priorities straight, kid."

"Hey!" The boy said in an attempt to defend himself. "It was either that or have my Internet privileges revoked! Seeing as how you're still all here, alive, I like to think that I chose the lesser of two evils!"

"…" Rika just scowled, but said nothing in response to that.

"Anyway," said Dean as he looked over at the Digi-destined who were gathering together. "I know that you all have questions, but I would like to have _everyone_ here before I answer any of them. It'll make things easier if I don't have to repeat myself." Turning to the other children he said, "Ryan? Could you come here for a second?"

"Why?"

"For starters, you're the reason how I'm going to get the other's to come here. For some reason I can't seem to find the others, and seeing as how you're dead, and that there's very little that's hidden from the dead I figured that I could make use of your unique abilities to draw them here. I'll do what I can on my end, but you'll need to be doing most of the legwork anyway. Especially since… um…"

"Let me guess," said Ryan with cool amusement. "Got school tomorrow?"

"Well, yeah."

Ryan sighed. "All right. I'll do it. Man, I was _so_ hoping for some rest. Being dead, I tend to feel tired a lot lately…"

"I know," said Dean sadly, causing Ryan to look at him strangely. "All right. It doesn't matter who you look for first, just look for them, and look for _everyone_ who has had a digimon partner in the past and is a canon character, including that Alice girl from season three. I have the feeling that we're going to be needing as much muscle as possible."

Ryan raised an eyebrow. "Okay," he said. "You do realize that chances are, I'm going to be upsetting a number of author's from the later seasons by pulling characters out of their stories?"

"I have every confidence that you'll get around them."

Ryan shrugged. "Nice to know that someone here has confidence in that. I'll be back as soon as I can."

Richoemon looked at his friend with sad eyes. "You're going again?"

"Yeah. Sorry bud, but I don't think that I can take you with me. But look at it this way, you get to hang out with the coolest people this side of the FanFic Domain for a little while."

"Okay…" whined the little dinosaur, not sounding very happy about the prospect.

"Don't worry Richoemon," said William. "You've got us here to keep you company."

"…"

"Forget it, Richoemon. I'm taking you with me."

"Remind me to throw salt at you when you get back." William looked over at Dean with suspicion. "He is coming back, right?"

"That depends on him," said Dean, and before anyone could say anything else Ryan's wispy form disappeared and headed on its search for allies. William turned back towards Dean.

"All right," he said. "Getting together all the CC's I can understand, but Alice? Last I checked she wasn't really even a Tamer!"

Dean looked at the boy impassively.

"There's Dobermon," was all he said.

"No digivice," was Will's response.

Dean chuckled. "I can fix that."

"I'll bet you can. Y'know, I can see why Ryan gets nervous about you guys. The control that you guys have over our lives is enough to make anyone a bit twitchy." He nodded in John's direction before continuing. "No offence."

"None taken," said John.

"Speaking of which," said Rika cocking her head to one side as she met the author's gaze. "I don't suppose that there's anything you can do to remedy Ryan's condition when he gets back is there? I imagine that he would like to be _alive_ and breathing again."

Dean's eyes softened and he looked away. "I'm sorry. But I can't."

"Can't? Or won't?"

"Can't. He was killed outside of a fic, so there's nothing that I can do for him. That and I didn't create him so I can't change anything about him or what happens to him. That's something that only his creator can do."

"I'm surprised that he hasn't joined in on the festivities," said Chris frowning. "Especially since we're smack in the middle of everything with the Digi-destined."

"Forget about him for now," said Dean yawning. "We have bigger fish to fry. Anyway, I've got to get to bed before my Mom hauls me off the computer by the ear. Tomorrow, we'll all get together, and everything will be explained then, and afterwards we can figure out a course of action." He turned to the Digi-destined. "I know that you would like to know more, and that you'll probably be trying to interrogate these other kids here, but you'll have to trust me on this." He was looking at Tai and Izzy as he said this, and the two had a serious look on their faces and they nodded grimly. Dean had no idea just how much it was that they remembered, but he knew that what they did was enough for them to get the idea, and he saw, to his own surprise, that the other Digi-destined nodded in agreement and understanding as well, even though they looked a bit confused as to why. Oh well.

"Well, see you guys in the morning," said Dean as he disappeared. The words _logging out_ could be faintly heard and the night was oddly silent. Not even the sound of a siren interrupted the quiet.

"Well," said William finally. "At least he didn't say _don't let the bed bugs bite_."

There was a general murmur of agreement at this.

A/N: Not exactly what I consider my best work, but this is just intermission before things get rolling again (what would it be called? A filler?), so it was a bit of R&R for my imagination. Anyway, 'till next time everyone:)

6


	23. Chapter 23

Disclaimer: own- adjective: pertaining to, or belonging to oneself, or itself, usually used after a possessive to emphasize the idea of ownership, interest, or relation conveyed by the possessive- This definition does not describe my relationship with the TV show _Digimon_ in any way, shape, or form as I don't own the show or the concept.

The Wages of Fans is Fiction: Chapter 23

The waves crashed upon the shore and a cold wind swept through his dark hair. On his shoulder, a dog rabbit digimon shifted uneasily as the two of them looked out towards a horizon that never changed. It was boring, dull, dreary, and, most importantly, it never changed. It was depressing just looking at the place, and it had a way of grating on one's soul, dragging it down as it made you believe all of the most horrible things about yourself that you had ever believed at one time or another. This was the place where darkness made its abode, and people and digimon like these two were not welcome there unless it had a use for them, as it did once before and will once again, time without end.

What else would one expect from that place of shadow known only to the digimon world as _The Dark Ocean_?

"The least that author could have done was leave us something to read before dumping us here," said the long eared digimon with a sigh.

"Terriermon…" muttered the boy that was his human partner known as Henry Wong.

"C'mone Henry," complained Terriermon. "The scene is boring here, and the author that left us here hasn't checked back on us in days. Think of all the fun that we're missing."

Henry Wong found it hard to argue with that point. Aside from the native digimon plus his own partner, there was absolutely nothing to do. And after a few days, even Terriermon was starting to grate on his nerves.

_You wait here,_ said the girl who had contracted him for this fic. _And I'll get back to you as soon as I'm able too._

Henry's sigh mirrored Terriermon's own boredom. He could only guess at what had happened that had made the girl run so late. School? Writer's block? The list was quite extensive, but those two tended to figure in the most. And of all places to be left stranded in it had to be in this miserable dump.

"HEY! HENRY!"

The boy turned at the sound of his name, his eyes widening as he saw four familiar figures coming towards him. One was a boy with messy, light brown hair in a blue hoody, and yellow goggles strapped to his head, and next to him bounded a large, red dinosaur with a goofy looking face. Behind them straggled another boy about the same age as the other boy, only there was something different about him than when he had last seen the kid. For starters, he could see right through him…

"Takato. Guilmon. Ryan," Henry said in surprise. "Um… what're you guys doing here?"

"Who cares, Henry?" Terriermon all but shouted as he hopped down from his Tamer's shoulder and ran up to greet them. "What matters is that they're here, and we don't have to be bored anymore! Hey, did you guys come to break us out or something?"

Takato put a hand behind his head. "You could say that," he said and let loose a chuckle, but it was quickly repressed when he winced in pain. Henry and Terriermon looked at him with a worried expression.

"You okay, Takato?" Henry asked.

"Ford," said Ryan as he approached. Henry gave him a quizzical look. Ryan sighed.

"The fic that he was in involved him getting run over by a truck. He was just getting clipped when I pulled him out of there. No fun."

Henry nodded in sympathy, having had his fair share of those kinds of fics himself, as had just about every other canon character in the business. Well, that's the life of a character in fan fiction…

Henry looked over at Ryan. "So, what's with the partially visible look?"

Ryan looked a little crestfallen. "It's a long story, Henry. And I've only got so much time to tell it, and seeing as how I'm already in the middle of something it's going to have to wait. I'm going to drop you off with the others and they can fill you in on what's going on. Sorry dude."

With that said a screen materialized before them, revealing a scene of devastation that made Henry and Terriermon's jaws drop in surprise. Turning to Ryan he asked, "I take it that this is part of the reason why you're the way you are?"

"I'm only a consequence of it. Like you guys I just had to do the hero bit. Enough chitchat though, I've got places to go. The others will fill you in on the details when you get there."

Henry looked at Takato, Guilmon, skeptically before turning to Terriermon, who just shrugged.

"Hey," the little digimon said with a smile. "It's gotta be better than waiting here for an author who never shows."

A second later Ryan was left alone on the gray beach as mist billowed up around him. He took a look around and there before him was the face of one, very irritated looking girl who suddenly and unexpectedly morphed into a giant red scaled dragon that resembled Azulongmon, only without the beard. It didn't take a rocket scientist to figure out that she was an author.

"Who are you, and what are you doing in my story?" She demanded angrily before taking a quick look around. "And where is Henry and Terriermon?"

The visage of a boy said nothing, and after making a motion that looked like he was kicking the sand off his feet he vanished, leaving one very confused author behind.

_What the heck just happened here?_

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The author sat at his accustomed lunch table, calmly munching away at the food that had made it to the cafeteria's main menu, quietly jotting down notes in a battered sketchbook and occasionally adding a piece of artwork to accompany it. He was working on his 'project', the one that would allow him to assume complete and total control over the story of Digimon. It was, what he considered his _doomsday_ _weapon_. It was the final choice for him, and in his hands he held the fate of an entire fad in his hands. No one here would really understand his reasons for it though, not even those that he had once considered 'friends'. Here he wasn't the _Lord of Fantasy_. To the world at large he was just another kid named…

"Mark," said a feminine voice as a tray was placed on the table and the seat across from him was now the occupied by the one person who had started this whole mess. Mark glared at her.

"Sarah," he said coldly.

"We need to talk."

"I don't think that we have anything left to talk about."

"Yes, we do," the girl, responded in the same tone of voice. "Why are you making this difficult? I just want us to be friends again."

"Then you shouldn't have dragged my beliefs through the mud the way you did!"

"It's just a show…"

"IT'S MORE THAN JUST A SHOW!" Mark shouted loudly, causing a number of eyes to look in their direction. Mark glared at them until they went back to their own daily lives, safe from the dangers of fandom. An uncomfortable silence fell between the two of them.

"Look," said Sarah. "I'm sorry, alright? I didn't mean to make you upset, but you do have a way of not letting things go. You go after things with a passion that scares me sometimes. It's almost like there's a hungry beast inside of you…"

"You've been the same too you know," said Mark harshly. "I remember our own conversations about your own preferences all to well. They got pretty heated then too."

"Yeah, but I didn't go out and try to dominate the entire FanFic Domain section of Digimon with one story. That's the difference between us. And how did you manage that by the way? I can't load up new stories anymore, at least nothing on the first two seasons."

Mark smiled for the first time now, but it was a cold, humorless thing that did not touch his eyes.

"Trade secret," he said and he got up, picking up his tray and heading for the trash barrel.

"Mark," Sarah called. "Stop this before it's too late. Stop before it's too late for us to be friends again."

Mark just waved a hand at her as he walked away. He had decided that he didn't want to hear what she had to say anymore.

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Even though he had done his best to avoid Sarah and the rest of his friends for the rest of the day, his conversation with Sarah still haunted him. As he got off the school bus and walked up to the front door of his home, he had to ask himself, was this road worth pursuing? Should he continue with his plan? Pulling out his keys and unlocking the door, Mark found that he had no immediate answer. Putting things back in perspective it did seem kind of stupid and pointless, it was just that he loved the show. He loved the characters, and he hated it how the creators dangled something like Taiora in his face only to snatch it away and replace it with something else. He supposed that was how real life worked, but aren't shows supposed to have happy endings for the characters?

That was all he wanted. A happy ending that he could be satisfied with. Make things the way they should be, as it was hinted at.

So why couldn't everyone else see it that way? Why couldn't Sarah see it that way?

As Mark opened the door and stepped inside, he heard the phone ring. Walking over to it, he checked the caller I.D. It was Sarah. Sighing, Mark walked up the stairs and headed for his room, leaving the phone to ring. No, he didn't want to talk to her right now. Not until everything else was settled. Sitting down at his computer, Mark fired it up, opened up his account to the FanFic Domain website, and activated the Microsoft word program. He made his decision. He would finish what he started. He would remake the Digimon story as he saw fit, and heaven help anyone or anything that stood in his way.

As always, when his hands were laid on the keyboard, his mind was transported to another world.

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Chris looked over the army that had been assembled. Well, if you count about two to three dozen kids with digimon partners as an army. They came from all seasons, one through five. Hellos were being exchanged and conversations held as characters, consisting mostly canon ones, got brought up to speed on the doings and happenings of the FanFic Domain. And the Digi-destined?

They were lost. Completely and utterly lost. The only reason that any of them stuck around was because of the promise that Dean had made that all would be revealed when everyone was assembled. The only ones that were left now were Ken, Yolie, and TK.

_I wonder what's keeping Ryan?_ Wondered Chris.

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A screen winked into existence inside the apartment, and from it emerged the ghostly image of a boy around twelve years of age. He took a look around the darkened room and frowned before beginning his exploration. After a few minutes, he headed for the bedrooms, stopping before one of them, the only one with a light on. There seemed to be some noise coming from it too, but he couldn't really identify what it was. _Well, nothing ventured, nothing gained_, thought the boy as he walked through the wall.

A second later, there were shouts of surprise emanating from the room.

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There was a bright light and a screen appeared, dumping into the streets two teenagers, one with dark hair, and the other with long violet hair. A crowd quickly gathered around them and helped them to their feet, ignoring their questions as they guided them over to where the first and second season Digi-destined were gathered. A second later, the ghost of Ryan emerged from the screen and it vanished behind him. He looked positively livid about something, and a red handprint crossed his left cheek. He looked into the crowd to see Chris, Richoemon, and Rika approaching. Chris's eyes widened as he took in the oddity of seeing some of the mist composing Ryan's face a slightly different color and in the shape of a hand.

"Should I even ask?"

"You know," said Ryan. "You probably shouldn't."

"Ryan?" Asked Richoemon innocently. "I was told that ghosts can't be hurt, but you look like someone just slapped you."

"Blunt as always Richoemon," said Ryan exasperatedly.

"So what happened?" Asked Rika.

"In a word: Yolie. After that, I'm going to have to take the fifth."

"I see," said Chris, the gears already turning in his mind. Oh yeah, he had a pretty good idea as to what had happened. But that still didn't explain one thing. "She actually made contact with you?"

Ryan's right eye twitched visibly. "What did I say about taking the fifth?"

Rika, Chris, and Richoeomon exchanged glances that contained something of amusement. Except for Richoemon. He just looked confused.

"Well, I'm taking that as a good sign," said Rika with a mischievous grin on her face. Had Ryan a spine that existed, he surely would have felt a shiver run down it. Chris poked his finger through his friend, and seeing that it passed through he frowned.

"Well, maybe not," he said.

"How many times do I have to tell people to _not_ do that? It just doesn't feel right."

"Why? What does it feel like?" Asked Rika.

"How does one describe having your molecules being distorted?"

Rika was just about to reply when a familiar figure approached them. It was Dean.

"You're back. Everything go well?" Dean then noticed the red mark on the spirit's face and grimaced. "Never mind. Is this everyone?"

"No, I can't seem to track down TK for some reason. I just can't see him. Sorry."

Dean sighed. "It's alright. We'll just have to make do without him. Okay Ryan, this is where I'm going to need your help again. When I brought you back, I inserted you into a fight between Wargreymon and Metal Garurumon…"

"Yeah, I remember," Ryan said with a frown.

"The reason that I did that was because of your _unique_ condition. By making physical contact with a Digi-destined or one of their partners you could reawaken either fully or partially their real memories instead of the ones that were forced on them. Seeing as how they're also linked, it works both ways. What I'm going to do next is going to be a bit dangerous, because I'm going to try and reawaken their memories all at once. To do that, you'll have to _not exist_ for a while."

"Wouldn't it be easier to just have me pass through them one by one? 'Cause I gotta say, I don't feel comfortable with this whole 'not existing' thing here."

"I agree with Ghost Boy," said Rika, and next to her, Chris, Caramon, and Richoemon nodded. "This does sound a little bit too dangerous to even try." Dean nodded his agreement also.

"I know, but I have no idea just how strong the Lord of Fantasy's influence is over the Digi-destined, and I'm quite certain that not all of them will want to go through with this either. Doing it this way ensures that our enemy won't be able to block our attempts at making them remember, or seize control of them at the wrong moment." Looking over in Tai's direction he said, "After all, that's what he did with Tai. Doing this will afford them some measure of immunity to his influence even if they don't remember everything fully."

"So how long do I have to _not exist_?" Asked Ryan, causing the others to look at him in shock. Dean shrugged his shoulders.

"That really depends on you, Ryan. If your creator was here, I wouldn't be worried about it, but then you being a ghost for this to work wouldn't be possible either. In any case, it just boils down to how badly you want to stay here."

Ryan thought about it for a bit. He knew that he had wanted to come back when he was first offered the opportunity to return, but now he was immaterial he had had some time to reflect on things. Having experienced purgatory, he didn't find the thought of going back there as disturbing as he once would have. And life? Things weren't what he thought it would be, nor was it what he wanted it to be. He felt as though he had so little control over it that sometimes it made him want to scream. When he first came into existence, he was happy. It was something new to him, but the realization that you just exist to be someone's 'plaything' had a way of numbing the experience.

There were times where the thought made him depressed, and he would wish that he would just stop existing to make it go away.

_Here's my opportunity,_ he thought in an almost monotone sense.

Looking down at Richoemon, he smiled. No, he had every intention of coming back, if only for this little guy here. His story, the one of life, not the fic, wasn't over yet and he wanted to see where it would lead. OC's might not last as long as Canon Characters because they never became legends (belief gives them a near immortality to their existence that OC's didn't share. Something to do with Union rules, he thought). Had he been able to he would have hugged the little dinosaur before deciding.

"Ryan?" Asked Dean.

"Alright," he said. "Let's get this over with."

Richoemon looked at his partner with a worried look. "You'll be back though, right?"

"No problem. I came back the first time didn't I?"

The relief that he saw in Richoemon's eyes was heartwarming.

Rika looked at Ryan, her face set in a fierce expression. "You'd better make sure that you come back you doofus. 'Cause if you don't, I'll haunt your spirit."

"Isn't it supposed to be the other way around?"

"Very funny."

Chris grinned at the exchange. Out of all of them, he knew Ryan the best and the longest. Being created at the same time had something to do with that, and in a sense it made them brothers in a way that was almost like blood relation. He felt confident that he'd see his friend again.

"You take care in oblivion, dude," said Chris with that same grin on his face. And just so he could head off Rika's attitude he hurriedly said, "See you soon. And if you don't make it, I'll join Rika in haunting you."

"Me too!" Said Richoemon gleefully.

Ryan rolled his eyes and Dean smiled.

"Ready?"

Ryan nodded his assent, and Dean put his hands around Ryan's head.

_This isn't so bad,_ was Ryan's last thought as his form disintegrated before their eyes. He didn't feel a thing.

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John stood next to Renamon, taking in the view of the full moon as it continued on its course over Odaiba. The air was a bit warm tonight, probably due to some of the fires that had been blazing from the battle, though they were now long out. He felt a little uncomfortable. Maybe it was because of the up and coming battle that he knew that they would most likely participate in. Yeah, that was it. Just that and nothing else.

Right?

"Renamon?" He asked. "What do you think will happen?"

The kitsune turned to look at the boy with her eyes so blue and bright, much like the light of the moon. As John stared into their depths, he felt his heart skip a beat and he quickly looked away, not really understanding the feelings that he felt roiling in his mind. Sure, the _Who's Who in Fan Fics_ had labeled them as being an item, but it was never something that they had admitted to each other or to themselves, ever since they met all those weeks ago. It was strange. Well, it was strange to him anyway. This sort of thing was written about in fics, but he never expected it to happen to _him_. He always thought that he'd end up falling for a regular girl, a human girl no less, and yet here he was acting like a schoolboy with a crush on a kitsune who usually showed about as much emotion as a glacier.

Life sure took some interesting twists didn't it?

"We will fight," said Renamon in response to his question. "And we will win."

"How can you be so sure of that?" Asked John, wishing that his voice didn't sound like it was cracking as he shifted uncomfortably. Slowly, Renamon reached over and entwined her claws around his fingers, giving the boy's hand a comforting squeeze, making him look over at her with surprise clearly written on his face and blushing like mad. Fortunately for him, Renamon was now looking at the soft glow of the full moon as it traced its arc through the sky.

"I have every reason too," Renamon said softly. Feeling some measure of comfort in her words, John smiled softly and returned his gaze to the moon, squeezing her paw back as the two of them shared a quiet moment together.

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"This is it, Dag," said Reno as he looked down at his partner. "Battle of the century and we're in it. Are you ready for it?"

Dagmon looked up at his friend. "Are you?"

Reno fell quiet. He wasn't sure how to answer that. Even though he had biomerged with Dagmon, _the right way_ this time, the taint from the corrupted biomerge still remained in his soul, and it troubled him greatly. He didn't really remember too much of what had happened at that time, except that he knew an immense rage and then there was Sakuyamon and her light. That healing light.

_I've got to believe that the others can depend on me when the chips are down. I've got to believe in myself if I'm going to be able to do this, so that we can win._

Reno almost couldn't believe that he was now thinking the same things that the show spouted almost every episode. Chuckling to himself he looked up at the sky.

_Maybe there is something to it after all,_ he thought.

"You know it, Dag," he said finally.

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Mimi held Izzy's hand in her own, trying to coax him to say something, but he still remained disturbingly quiet. He looked at her from time to time with a great sadness in his eyes, but couldn't seem to bring himself to say what was troubling him.

"Izzy? Could you please say something? Anything? You've been so quiet lately…"

"We've been living a lie."

Mimi blinked. Did… did he just…? But why?

"What do you mean?" Mimi asked, feeling scared for some reason.

"It doesn't matter," Izzy said quietly, trying not to meet her gaze. Gripping the boy's chin she forced him to meet her eyes.

"It matters to me Izzy. I love you, or have you forgotten that?"

Izzy's face flinched. "That's just the problem. I haven't forgotten. In fact, I've remembered. I remember not just our time together, the life that we've shared, the one that you know, but I remember… other things too. Things of another life, the one that should be but for some reason isn't… and I feel… afraid."

Mimi felt her heart clench. What was it that Izzy remembered that made him so scared about things between him and her? Her grip on the computer genius's hand tightened as she pulled the boy into a hug.

"Izzy, don't you know that as long as I'm here you don't have to be afraid?"

The boy didn't give her an answer in words, but instead clutched her desperately as though she were a lifeline, crying softly onto the girl's shoulder.

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Sora watched Mimi and Izzy compassionately before turning away from them and walking over to where Tai and Agumon stood. Like Izzy, Tai had been quiet of late. At first she had passed it off as a result of his fight with Matt, but ever since that 'Dean' boy had made his latest guest appearance, something seemed to pass between them that made her question her original assessment of Tai's feelings. Could he have experienced something similar to what was making Izzy feel the way he was now? Questions abounded by the multitude in her mind as she came up to her fiancé, but before she could ask one of them, her mind suddenly went blank and a torrent of memories washed over her, and were gone before she could fully understand what they entailed.

But in them, Sora felt a sense of honest truth about what had been taken from her, from all of them against their will, and in that moment she understood what Izzy and Tai were feeling, what everyone must now be feeling, and she felt such anger at the unfairness that she knew what she had to do.

She could almost feel pity for the person who was responsible for what had been done to them. Almost.

As the saying goes, _Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned._

A/N: Okay. I've got an idea kicking around in my head for this story, but I'm going to need a good song for it. Preferably a song that usually describes an ending to an adventure (it's gotta be upbeat too). If anyone has any suggestions for one, feel free to let me know. Later all:)

10


	24. Chapter 24

Disclaimer: At the risk of repeating myself, I have to say that _I don't own Digimon._

The Wages of Fans is Fiction: Chapter 24

"So, the boy who brought me here is _dead_?" Asked a blonde haired girl in a black dress to William. Her name was Alice McCoy, and standing next to her was a large dog like digimon named Dobermon who, in the third season of the show, had sacrificed himself to give the Tamers the ability to biomerge in the real world. Through the miracle of Fanfiction, he was back among the living, and Alice was made his Tamer. It pays to have authors who are willing to write revival fics.

William nodded. "That's what tends to happen when your body gets cremated by an angry Black Wargreymon."

"Weird," said the girl as she looked at the black trim D-Arc that the author Dean had given her when she had shown up. William raised an eyebrow.

"Don't know why _you_ find it weird, if half the things I heard about you are true," said William. "I've heard rumors that you had _passed on_ yourself prior to your own appearance on the show." Alice looked at the boy with a look on her face that was almost like Rika's back when she was the ice queen, though for some reason Alice had a way of making it look colder (something that he had never before believed possible). William felt the temperature around him drop several degrees before he quickly amended what he had just told the girl. "But then, that's just what I hear and it's never been proven really." Backing up, William decided that now might be a good time to live up to that saying '_discretion is the better part of valor'_. Sweat dropping William made up an excuse to check up on his friends and bid the girl farewell as she cocked a cold, disinterested eyebrow at him. As William left he could swear that he could feel her icy eyes on his back. Next to him Gaomon looked up at him.

"You okay?"

"Oh, yeah," he said. "Sure. Despite the fact that I feel like I just took a tour in a frozen meat locker, I'm fine." He took a look at his partner and sighed. "Yeah, okay. Bad analogy. But you gotta admit, that girl can be downright creepy at times…" William was suddenly cut off as an arm circled itself around his neck and pulled him into a headlock. Knuckles soon began to fiercely scrape against his scalp, and William struggled madly to break his assailants hold on him.

"Kazu," William growled. "Get _off_ of me! How many times do I have to tell you not to do that?" Throwing off the boy's arm William glared at the tall, visor wearing boy in the heavy metal t-shirt, who just simply grinned like a lunatic and rubbed the back of his head. Next to him, his friends Kenta, Guardromon, and MarineAngemon looked at the kid with a look of embarrassment.

"Aw, c'mone Will," laughed Kazu. "You know it's only because we hardly ever get to see you. You're never in the story with us."

"That's because I'm not supposed to be in the fic with you guys," Will said as he crossed his arms. "I'm supposed to be introduced later on. That's how it goes." Spying someone he recognized in the crowd William decided to beat yet another hasty retreat.

"Look guys, I gotta go." Kazu pouted as the red haired boy left them behind.

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Rika had her arms wrapped around herself as she walked up to her old friends Takato and Henry. As much as she tried not to show it, she was worried. Events were just becoming a little too weird and a little too hectic for her tastes. It reminded her of the old days back when D-Reaper was destroying the world, her world, and while she did find the adrenaline rush exhilarating, she now wished that it was under different circumstances.

Like a fic for example.

"Hey, Rika," said Takato trying to muster up some measure of cheerfulness. "Everything alright?" Rika just nodded mechanically. She may have been friends with them, but she wasn't about to open up right away.

"So it seems that everyone who can make it is here," she said trying to fill the silence. The two boys nodded.

"I have to admit," said Henry. "This was certainly something that I never saw coming. Wonder how the Digi-destined are coping with this."

"I think Ryo was checking up on them," said Takato. "From what I saw though, they did not look happy."

"Who would?" Said Rika, anger clear in her voice. "They just found out that their memories were messed around with, and that everything that they believed in is now a lie! They have every reason to be upset!"

"You mean like you were when you found out that you were a fictional character?" Asked Jeri as she and her partner Leomon approached the group.

Rika's eyes narrowed at first before softening, and she looked away. Jeri Katou placed an arm on her shoulder.

"I'm sorry Rika," she said sadly. "I shouldn't have said that. None of us were very happy finding out that we weren't…_ real_."

"It doesn't matter," muttered Rika. "As for us not being real, that's a lie. We are real and you know it, just not in the normal sense of the word."

Jeri giggled. "There's the Rika we all know and love." The other's laughed at this, and even Rika couldn't help but grin a little.

"So," said Takato after the laughter died away. "Any idea when we'll be heading out to kick bad guy butt?"

Rika shrugged her shoulders. "That's up to Dean I guess. We take off when he's ready to go and not a second sooner."

Henry raised an eyebrow. "I'm surprised that you're not chomping at the bit to get us going. It's not like you to just sit and wait for someone to give the go ahead to charge into battle."

"Well, it doesn't help when I have no idea where we're going now does it?"

"She does have a point there," said Takato.

"Never thought that I'd see Rika be cautious where Angel's fear to tread," said Henry jokingly. Rika growled at him.

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Dean had just finished conjuring up the Golden Digi-egg of Destiny and passed it to the Digi-destined known as Willis before wiping his brow. He was working non-stop to get everyone ready for the coming battle, but now he was almost done. All he needed to do now was open a gateway to their destination and they were set. Reaching out with his author's senses he felt around the intricate weavings of the website until he found the main server. It would take only a few minutes for him to access it, seeing as how he was connected to one of the server's managers (otherwise it'd be impossible for him to get through without hiring a hacker, and he did not trust those people at all), but it would still be tough. The FanFic Domain was renown for having some pretty slick defenses (despite having one author actually slip past them and take over an entire genre of fan fiction).

_Well, I always did like a good challenge,_ thought Dean as he deepened his concentration. Unconsciously, he brought his hands up and began moving them around in strange motions. Had Izzy or Henry been there, they would have recognized the motions as belonging to the workings of a computer keyboard and a mouse.

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John and Renamon had parted ways for the time being because as the kitsune put it, she needed to be with her Tamer when it was time to get moving. John had agreed and was now looking for his partner Tapirmon, who had earlier taken off to give the two of them some quality time alone. Of course, looking for the enigmatic rookie could sometimes be troublesome…

"HEY! JOHN!"

Turning towards the voice, John winced as he saw whom it belonged to. It came from a red haired boy who had been part of Renamon's group when he got attacked by Black Wargreymon. _What was his name again? Oh yeah, William._ John could not say that he was overjoyed to see him. Earlier in the day the kid had tried to assault him because he was an author, and at the time it was an author who was responsible for killing Ryan. The kid's anger was understandable, and he seemed to have forgotten it as time went on (no doubt due to Ryan's return, even if it was just in spirit form), but the memory still made John cautious around him whenever they talked, which wasn't often.

_So what's he want now?_

The kid walked up to him with his Gaomon in tow and paused, looking at him in the eyes before speaking.

"So… um… you and Renamon are an item, huh?"

William nodded.

"How did that happen anyway?"

John covered a laugh with a cough. "It was actually kind of a stupid thing on my part. Very embarrassing, and during a situation where that sort of thing wasn't called for, but it definitely got results. I have to say, outside of the 'Adventurer's Battle' movie it was the first time I had ever seen Renamon actually laugh. Even Rika was stunned when she saw it. It was weird just seeing. Why do you ask?"

William shrugged. "No reason really. Just curious." There fell between them an awkward silence.

"I'm sorry," said William finally, causing John to look at him with his eyes wide.

"Huh?"

"I want to apologize about earlier, before we came here, when I… well, anyway, I just want you to know that I… um… didn't mean it. I was just mad at the time, and it was wrong of me to put the blame on you." William rubbed the back of his head, looking embarrassed. "So, sorry."

John looked at William thoughtfully before replying. "You're right that you were angry, and it was wrong of you to blame me for what happened earlier to your friend. But I don't think that you are really sorry at all."

William's eyes widened in shock. "Wha…? But I am…!" John stopped him with a raised hand.

"That's just my opinion, Will," he told him calmly. "Tell you what: Let's start over, and be friends. And when this adventure is over you and I can do something later. I know a nice Internet café where we can go and buy each other a few rounds. Share a little friendship fic and be none the worse for wear. What do you say?" With that said, John lowered his hand in an extension of friendship and acceptance. William stared at him in stunned amazement until Gaomon nudged him, indicating for him to wake up from his stupor and do something. William gripped John's hand and smiled.

"There's just one thing though. Aren't I a little young to be buying you 'rounds'?"

John chuckled. "We can fix that."

William had to laugh.

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Sweat rolled down Dean's face as he focused, his will hammering against the walls that denied him access until… Finally! A hole formed in the air before him and flattened out, turning into a screen that was commonly known as a link. Wiping his forehead, he turned towards the group of children and Digimon standing behind him and smiled.

"It's time," he said and they all turned to him.

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In the heart of a land held in shadow, a great evil was awakening, beyond anything that the FanFic Domain had ever known since the days of the South Park/ Naruto crossover. For now, it had to be protected until it was ready to burst forth into the world and make its presence known, and it had that in abundance.

_They're coming,_ thought a presence from within the shadows. It was not worried by this. It knew them all, and was well prepared for their arrival. Of course there was always that chance that they would find a way to turn the tables as they always did.

But this wasn't the show, and it wasn't a fic. This was the real deal, and blood and data alike would most likely flow if they continued on their course of action. There was no getting around it; people would get hurt, and there would be a lot of scars both physically and emotionally.

The presence sat up, alerting the others to the situation, but telling them to hold back and to not do anything until any attack was made on their position. Above all else, none of them were to be destroyed until either the project was ready or unless there was no other alternative.

Of course, that's what the backup plan was for, just in case.

Concealed in darkness, the presence could be felt smiling as the clock began to tick downwards towards its preordained end.

_Let them come,_ it thought.

A/N: That bit about Alice at the start of the chapter was something that I read off of Wikipedia, and it provided an external link to the character notes from the executive producer of Digimon Tamers (Chiaki J. Konaka), and from what I've read they seemed to indicate that either Alice had 'died' or may have gone to the digital world and it was taken from everyone that she did die, including herself, without really knowing the truth. Dunno if this is true as nothing more was done with the character or the series, but I thought that it would be an interesting bit of information to include. Later everyone!

5


	25. Chapter 25

Disclaimer: Me no own Digimon.

The Wages of Fans is Fiction: Chapter 25

Tai Kamiya looked at the assembled Digi-destined, or rather the ones from the first two seasons. The others were currently filing through the portal, heading into the wild blue yonder to face… who knows what? The boy, Dean, said that they were fighting something called an author. It sounded vaguely familiar to him, and he knew that he should remember what that meant to him, but the full meaning of those strange memories, the ones that he knew deep within his heart were true, were just outside of his reach. Outside of all their reach. What he did remember though was enough for him to trust the boy in whatever he intended, and he intended to follow him into whatever hell he was headed if it meant not only finding the rest of himself, but also delivering a hefty dose of payback to go along with it. He wished that there were some other way, that he could find some other reason than revenge, but he just felt so violated. Earlier he had been forced to fight and nearly kill his best friend. There was no reason given, no questions asked, just a simple overriding of all conscious thought and he was turned into a tool, nothing more, nothing less.

Tai had an idea of what rape must be like.

Yeah, he wanted to go in there and get what he felt was justice to him, but he had to remind himself of the difference between justice and revenge. One wrong move could make him become worse than the enemy that they were fighting. One of the memories that he had gotten back involved a story about one of the other kids, the 'Tamer' with those yellow goggles on his head, about how he turned his best friend into a monster when he lost it in his need for revenge. It was eerily similar to when he had forced Agumon to digivolve and he wound up as Skullgreymon. If what that 'Takato' kid went through was even worse, he could only imagine what could happen if the same thing happened to Agumon. This was something that he wanted to drill into the others before they got under way. If they even did want to come at all that is.

Fixing them with a determined look he spoke, calmly and carefully.

"I know what you guys are going through," he told them. "You feel as though your lives were just torn from you, that everything that you've ever believed in was stolen from underneath your noses and held up for mockery." His eyes rested first on Kari, wondering what she must be going through; on Davis with a look on his face as though he had lost all sense of hope and direction; on Matt, who's face though looked calm held a deep seated anger that was buried just beneath the surface like a sleeping dragon. One by one he looked them over, gauging their reactions before finally halting on Sora, who looked almost like a mirror image of Matt. Tai felt a pain in his heart at what he had now lost. He remembered what that strange creature had said earlier, just before his fight with Matt.

_"It's not about what he did to me, Tai, but what he did to you."_

_No,_ he thought. _This isn't about what Matt did to me. Sora made her choice, as did me and Matt. We both swore that we'd never let anything come between us again, and I have every intention of keeping that promise no matter what! No demented super-powered being is going to make me break it just because he was unhappy with the way things turned out._

_That's what friendship is all about._

"I'm telling you this, because those others are going out there to find whoever's responsible for what was done to us, and hopefully take him down. And I'm going with them." That did it. That got them all to sit up and take notice. "I don't know what I'm going to be getting into, but I want to face this, and I believe that we all should face this, together, just like in the old days. It may be hard for some of you though, and I'll understand if you don't want to come along…"

"I'm coming."

Tai looked at Sora. So did the others, their eyes wide in surprise at her outburst. Tai nodded, as though he had expected nothing less. In truth, he was a bit surprised. He had expected Matt or Davis to be clambering to jump onto the ship, but he didn't show any reaction to her unexpected desire to come along. If this got the ball rolling than nothing will.

Matt stood up as well, so did Ken and Yolie (though she was a little bit more hesitant). Cody did to with some measure of hesitation, alongside Joe. Kari looked over at Davis with sorrowful eyes before adding her support. The only ones who were left sitting down were Izzy, Mimi, and Davis. Tai looked at them with hopeful eyes, and after a minute Izzy stood with Mimi looking at him worriedly, though she soon joined him too. The only one left was Davis.

Davis felt so lost, and miserable. _Everything… it was all a lie?_ How could it be? He remembered so many things, so many good things. Most of all, he remembered Kari. That was a lie too? Ever since he had met the Digi-destined of Light he had felt drawn to her, and after everything, after all this time believing that they were destined to be together it turns out that she was never truly his to begin with? That it was all just a dream? _What am I going to do?_

Kari looked at the goggle wearing boy with sorrowful eyes. She truly pitied Davis, and not just because of how he must be feeling, but also because of how she's feeling. She remembered all the times that they spent together, both lives, and in each one she had seen sides of him that she had never expected from the boy. In the other set of memories she had learned to love him and, truth be told, she still did. But it no longer felt the same. This was going to leave scars that they'd all remember for years to come.

Davis's silence was scaring her, and she wanted desperately to reach out and hold him, reassure him, but something held her back. Not that it mattered. With a sigh, Davis pulled himself to his feet, probably with that same stubbornness that made him go head to head with MaloMyotismon with no one to back him up. Basically, he was pulling himself up by his shoelaces, which was all the material that he ever really needed.

In a voice that shook a little bit with unsaid pain, but would still hold firm against all the onslaughts that the world could muster, Davis spoke. If it came from anyone else, it wouldn't have been the same. In his words, which were nothing special, nothing dramatic, he was summing up everything about how they all felt, and that was what got the wheel to turn.

That was why Tai had chosen him to bear his goggles in the first place.

"Let's do this," he said in a tone of a far off thunderstorm. "Let's go down there, and get some answers, and get our lives _back_."

There were a number of nods and affirmations at this, not least of all from Tai, but he still had to get his two cents in and hope that they could understand where he was coming from.

"Alright. We're all doing this, but you have to remember that this isn't going to be about revenge. If any of you are going in just for that than you should sit this one out. We don't need that kind of attitude clouding up the battlefield. That doesn't mean that you should hold back if we do have to fight. By all accounts, what we're heading into is going to be bad, and we have to be ready for it." He looked over at Cody, knowing how he felt about that sort of thing. Silently he wished that TK were here too. He wondered why he wasn't able to make it.

"If everyone's set, than get to it. Next stop, Armageddon."

"No refunds for tickets," joked Armadillomon under his breath, though it didn't sound as though he put much effort into it.

No one laughed.

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Dean watched as the characters marched through the portal, each of them going in teams according to their season. He was disturbed by the lack of TK's presence, but had believed Ryan when he told him that he couldn't find him. As he had said, not much gets past the dead.

Oh well, as soon as everyone made landfall he'd put together a scouting party and see what kind of opposition that they were up against, and then formulate a battle plan. Considering how things had gone so far, he had every reason to believe that the way would not be easy.

The Savers group made their way through first, than frontier followed by the Tamers. Most of the Digi-destined had already gone through, with the exception of Tai. He hung back for some reason. The OC's and the Avatar that had been at the center of this adventure approached the portal. Dean raised an eyebrow.

"You guys coming too?"

William, Chris, Caramon, Reno, Dagmon, John, Tapirmon, Richoemon, and Gaomon nodded. The look in their eyes told him that they intended to follow even if they had to walk all the way.

"We've come this far," said the blonde haired boy named Chris. "We're going the rest of the way."

"And you can't stop us," said John as he folded his arms across his chest.

Next to Dean, Tai nodded. "Well," he said. "The more, the merrier. I just hope you guys know what you're getting yourselves into."

He and Dean stepped aside and allowed the kids to go through. As the last of them entered the portal Dean looked at Tai.

"You ready?"

Before Tai could answer, a mist began to form in front of the portal. It rose up and collapsed into the shape of a person, and with an effort formed the ghostly body of a boy that they both recognized. Tai winced. The kid looked really out of it. He had heard about what had happened, and felt bad for him, but there was nothing that could be done. So far as he knew that is.

The boy's form almost seemed to lose cohesion for a second, as if he were having a hard time keeping it together, but finally it held firm.

"Told… ya… that… I'd be back," he rasped.

_Jeez, he sounds like he's just come out of Hell, _thought Tai.

And who knows? Maybe he had.

Dean raised an eyebrow again. "You sure that you want to come along, Ryan? You don't look to be in particularly good shape right now."

The ghost shrugged and smiled faintly. "I was there with the others when this whole thing started. I wanna see how it's going to end," he said. "Might be worth it. Maybe I can do something else to while I'm here. The world's full of surprises after all…"

Dean nodded. "Can't argue with that. Let's go."

As the three of them headed for the portal, Tai looked at the boy and grinned apologetically.

"By the way, how's your hand feel?"

"You know, I hardly feel it…"

(Start playing '_Here We Go…!'_)

Narrator: "What dangers wait for our heroes as they step into the abyss? Find out next time on the next _Digimon: Digital Fiction_ (yeah, yeah. Corny name, I know)!"

A/N: I didn't have a whole lot to do today, so I was able to update pretty quickly, which makes me feel a little bit happy. It makes me believe that I might actually be able to finish this story (grins). We'll see what happens. Until next time then, read, review, peace!

5


	26. Chapter 26

Disclaimer: Digimon is owned by people who can crush me financially if I claim that I own their product, so I must make it clear that I don't own Digimon.

The Wages of Fans is Fiction: Chapter 26

A cold wind swept over the rugged terrain, whistling through the many cracks and miniature canyons that gave the place a treacherous look. The sky above was gray and ominous, a promise of a never-ending threat to all who dwelt underneath it. The rock that composed the landscape was barren, and was a swirl of grays and blues, with an occasional white thrown in for varieties sake. Off in the distance, a solitary shape stood, tall and foreboding, like a dark tower waiting for a hero worthy enough to enter its hallowed halls, slay the dragon guarding it, and rescue the damsel in distress.

God, the drama was so thick you could cut it with a knife for dinner. One serving feeds all.

"The suspense is killing me," said Chris as he looked through a pair of binoculars that Dean had given him. Next to him William nodded. It was too quiet here, here at the center of the Digimon branch of the FanFic Domain. The place should have been bustling with activity. Everything from PM's to author's walking in to submit stories and reviews. At the very least, there should have been more colorful.

It had been the last time Chris and William had been here, back when they were first created.

"Knock it off you guys, we've got a job to do," said a female voice coolly from behind them, causing them to turn in its direction. By the sound of the girl's attitude they could have almost sworn that they were talking to Rika, however they both knew better. For one thing there was a huge difference in appearance, the most notable of which was the hair color, which was black with silver tipped strands to the mid back. Next up were the sky blue eyes that most defined her features. Had a way of piercing you with an icicle like glare when she got really irritated with someone, as Chris had already found out much to his own dismay. She also wore dark blue jeans, a black shirt, a dark blue jean jacket that sported a Red Crescent moon on the back, and Yin-Yang symbols around the neck. She was, in Chris's opinion, more punk like than Rika Nonaka (if that was even possible), and he had told William so when he thought that she wasn't listening.

Shortly thereafter the two boys found out that the girl, whose name was Kaio Griffen, could be quite snarky and sarcastic when she put her mind to it, and they had no idea if that was because they had made her angry or if it just happened to be her regular attitude.

At least she hadn't hit them… so far.

William sighed and asked Chris for the binoculars so that he could take a look around, which Chris did grudgingly.

The three of them were on a scouting mission, though why it was these three specifically was lost to Chris. Aside from a snide comment from Henry's Terriermon about how OC's are, as he put it, _expendable_ (earning him a scolding by his Tamer) they didn't know why it had to be them. Well, Chris could understand Kaio. She, like Rika, seemed perfectly suited to this sort of task, and with the added bonus of being an OC to boot (she herself had glared most venomously at Terriermon when he made that comment), there seemed to be little doubt as to the wisdom of Dean's choice (over Tai's heated protests). As for Chris himself? No idea whatsoever, unless you counted having backup in case they got jumped and either needed an extra able body to fight or at least have someone return with whatever information that they may have gleaned from their mission. William and Gaomon were a tricky question though; unable to digivolve, they were for all intents and purposes nothing more than glorified spectators. Just where do you go with that? But Dean had given them his assurances that they might need him and that seemed enough. Besides, Will _had_ been itching for something to do (though Gaomon clearly wasn't as eager), and it gave Dean the perfect opportunity to shut him up.

An exasperated sigh escaped Kaio's mouth and Chris turned to her.

"What's up?"

"Him," was all she said as she pointed in the direction of the strange tower. Chris followed her finger towards a ghostly visage that stood a short ways off, and Chris sighed too. Officially, they were a team of three, and that was all that Dean would allow. The smaller the party, the less of a chance there was to be discovered.

Ryan just invited himself. The thing was, he wasn't doing anything. He was just standing there, looking at that tower thing at the horizon.

"What's the problem?" Chris asked. "He's not doing anything."

"That's exactly my point," said Kaio sharply. "All he does is stand there and stare while he's out in the open. He could give away our position!"

"Kaio, any of us could be giving away our position without even trying and you're no exception. Look around us, there's practically nothing to speak of for geography except that the terrain is slightly irregular and the occasional canyon. Other than that, there's nothing."

The girl _hmmphed_. "Well, the least he could do is something _other_ than just stand there like a zombie!"

"Kaio…" Chris growled, his eyes narrowing in annoyance, a look that was swiftly matched by the dark haired girl.

"Will you two knock it off?" Demanded Gaomon hotly. "You two are like Davis and Yolie from season 2, and I have had about all I can stand from those two already."

"He's telling the truth about that," said Will. "He used to have night terrors about those two arguing. Kept me up for weeks on end."

Kaio sweat dropped. "… I'm positive I didn't hear that right…"

Caramon cleared his throat. "Um… as interesting as that bit of information is, don't we have a mission to complete?"

The three kids exchanged glances and nodded.

"First sensible thing I've heard all day," muttered Kaio.

Chris took a look at Ryan and sighed inwardly. Kaio did have a point though. Ryan had been pretty lifeless since his second return, no pun intended of course. Maybe the experience of not actually existing was pretty harsh for him, and having to pull yourself back together couldn't have been very pleasant either. Okay, sure, this sort of thing was to be expected from the dead, but he had been more active when he first came back. Now he seemed so… _exhausted_. He didn't react to things as much as he used to, and seemed pretty distant towards everything. He didn't even respond to Rika's jibes when she saw him back again. Mostly, he just stared blankly at her, until she got a little unnerved, and that in turn unnerved a whole lot of other people. He would still talk of course, but with the tone of someone who was run down. As for whatever reasons he may have for tagging along without Dean's permission, Chris didn't know. He may just have wanted something to kill the time with.

Again, no pun intended.

"Why is everything so barren here?" Chris asked Kaio, hoping to distract himself from the depressing thoughts on his friend. Kaio turned to him with a raised eyebrow.

"You haven't figured it out? For one thing there's only one story on this section of the FanFic Domain site, and another it's a story that's in revolt against itself. No room for creativity and uncooperative characters makes for a pretty sad environment. It saps the life out of the place."

"Why would anyone want to do that?" Asked Chris with a sad look in his eyes. "This place… when I saw it for the first time I thought that it was so beautiful. The nicest sight I had ever seen, and I _still_ have yet to see anything that can beat it. Not even my fic home compares to what this place used to be, so… why?"

Kaio shrugged. "Some people can be so focused on a goal that they don't see what they trample in their way."

Chris turned away as he felt his eyes water a bit. "Why couldn't he just leave things be? Things were so much better that way. I wish that nothing had changed…"

A short distance away, Ryan seemed to chuckle; as if at a private joke as he looked at the tower. "If wishes were fishes," he said distantly. William lowered the binoculars and looked oddly at the ghost.

"I can never understand his sense of humor," he muttered.

Raising the binoculars again William took another look through them, focusing on the tower that seemed to fascinate his deceased friend so much.

"You know," he said. "I don't even know what it is that we're looking for. I mean there's the main Digimon FanFic building. Looks _very _different from what I remember about it but it definitely is the place all right. You never forget the place once you've been there, no matter what it looks like." Chris and Kaio nodded. The place had that kind of affect on OC's and CC's alike.

"I remember a _Pet co. _sign there for some reason before Ryan and I went to Odaiba," said Chris.

Kaio looked at him. "A _Pet co._ sign?"

"It's probably better not to ask. I didn't."

"Obviously," said the girl as she returned her gaze back towards the horizon. As she watched a figure appeared on it and began to come closer. Chris tensed slightly, but a look over at William as he looked through the binoculars assured him that they weren't in any danger. As time passed, the figure loomed larger in their vision, revealing the champion form of Kaio's digimon, Dicedramon, who had gone on ahead to scout around the area and see if they may have missed anything. She was easily the size of Greymon, reptilian in appearance with a cobra shaped head, and wore armor over her body, and behind her extended a long rattle-snake tail. Chris groaned as Dicedramon approached.

"I still can't believe that you had your partner digivolve just to do a little scouting."

Kaio glared at him. "How else could she defend herself properly if she ran into trouble?"

"You could have digivolved her to Ultimate or Mega or something…"

"With power level's like that, we might attract the wrong kind of attention…"

"And your partner's rattle snake tail won't do the same? C'mone, with the noise it makes I'm surprised that we aren't up to our ears in enemies…"

Kaio looked ready to blow her stack as a red vein throbbed visibly on her forehead. Fortunately for Chris she didn't get a chance to.

"Would you two knock it off?" Said Ryan as he approached. "I'm starting to think that Gaomon's right when he compares you two to Davis and Yolie, what with the way you guys have been right at each other's throat for the majority of this trip."

"She started it!"

"No, you started it!"

"Chris," said Ryan as he rolled his eyes. "You started it. Now would you _please_ be quiet? I'm trying to concentrate."

"What for?" Asked Kaio. "Trying to keep the wind from blowing your form to mist?"

"Well, that too," said Ryan without bothering to make a defense for himself as he normally would. "But more, I'm trying to see what's around the Digimon Branch Domain Tower. It's a little hard for some reason…"

"Well, would you hurry it up? Dean's got us on a time schedule here."

Ryan frowned, which was the most emotional facial expression that he had shown in the last four hours since he came back. "Could almost swear I was talking to Rika," he muttered as he looked back at the tower. He narrowed his eyes for a second, and then they widened in shock. "THERE! Look there, Will! Not at me, stupid! The tower!"

"What am I looking for?" Asked Will, only to have the binoculars swiped out of his hands by Chris.

"Let me try," he said as he focused the lenses on the distant building, just in time to see a shroud of darkness appear and from it emerged one very frightening and very familiar figure. He stood at the tower's entrance, wrapped in red and gray robes with a symbol of wrath emblazoned on his hood. Horns arched from the sides of his skull, and behind his back sprouted two massive reptilian wings.

_Oh, no,_ thought Chris as he felt a cold sweat crawl down his back. _Not Daemon…_

As he watched more shrouds of darkness began to appear around the tower, and suddenly all of the OC's digivices were going off. Kaio took hers out and looked at it. She frowned.

"I'm picking up seven signals," she said and Chris all but froze on the spot. He had an idea as to what those other six signals were.

_Makes sense. One plus six does equal seven after all…_

As Chris watched through the binoculars, Daemon's eyes turned in their direction, causing him to gasp and drop them.

"We gotta get out of here," he said as fear began to edge its way into his voice.

"Why?" Asked Kaio.

"One word. Daemon."

That got the gears going in Kaio's mind. _Oh, crap, _she thought as she did the math and she quickly raised her digivice, trying to activate a web link. A light began to burn in the direction of the tower.

"Faster would be better," said Chris as the light got brighter.

"You're not helping," replied Kaio distractedly as she desperately concentrated. William looked at them.

"Would someone care to explain to me what's going on?" A web link flashed into existence as the light turned into a great torrent of fire, heading in their direction. Chris grabbed Will and Gaomon and shoved them towards the screen.

"GET THROUGH THE LINK NOW!" Chris shouted.

The fire roared at them.

The heat was everywhere.

5


	27. Chapter 27

Disclaimer: People other than me own Digimon.

The Wages of Fans is Fiction: Chapter 27

Dean waited patiently as he looked up at the cloudy sky, trying not to let his anxiety show. _I wonder what it is that they'll find,_ he thought. _What dangers will we encounter? I hope that they're okay._ A cloud parted, revealing the first stars of evening in the orange light that signified the fall of dusk.

_An ending to an ending,_ Dean thought. _How appropriate. I wonder what's going through the minds of all the other authors. It doesn't seem like any of them will be here to help us. A pity. I had hoped for more from them, especially from guys like Pepper. But that's life I suppose._ Dean tried to turn his thoughts away from those depressing thoughts but couldn't seem able to. The Lord of Fantasy was an extremely powerful author. All of his activities had proven that so far. Locking authors out of their accounts, summoning up digimon like Black Wargreymon and the Dark Masters, deleting whole stories, affecting characters to the point where they no longer remembered their original lives… the list just seemed endless.

But then, for all he knew all authors were capable of doing things like this. It's just that the Lord of Fantasy was the first to try it.

The scuff of a shoe on stone caught his attention and Dean turned towards the sound, his eyes settling on a familiar red haired Tamer.

"What do you want, Rika?"

The girl actually looked startled for a second, but she quickly regained her composure.

"I was just wondering if you've seen Ryan around lately. I haven't seen him since you've sent Will, Chris, and that Kaio kid off to scout ahead…"

"Don't ask me," said Dean almost harshly. "I didn't keep track of that OC even when he was alive."

"A simple _no_ would have been enough," said Rika coldly. Dean looked into the girl's eyes before his face softened.

"Look, I'm sorry. I've just had a lot on my mind lately, and I haven't had time to think about the little things..."

"You were the one who brought Ryan back and he's a _little thing_ to you?"

"I'm fighting a war here, Nonaka. I can only focus on the things that I can affect right now."

There followed a tense silence between them.

"Anyway," said Rika, feeling uncomfortable. "What do you think they'll find out there?"

Dean shrugged. "Not a clue. This place has changed quite a lot since I was last here. All I can say is that it would be prudent to expect anything and everything at this point. After all, the Lord of Fantasy holds the keys to the Domain Tower, which is a central point to the Digimon branch of fan fiction. He's got a lot of resources to draw from, but I'm surprised that he hasn't been throwing them at us since we got here. He's got to know that we're here, but why he's not doing anything about it is bugging me."

"He might not know that we're here," said Rika.

"He's at the central point of our universe with access to the ability to create stories and control characters. He should know that we're here. He can hardly miss us."

The two of them exchanged a look.

"You think we'll be walking into a trap, don't you?" Asked Rika.

"That possibility has crossed my mind."

"Terrific. What are the odds that it'll be pulled off and actually beat us, though? We have five seasons of characters here, plus some OC's. We've got a fair number of digimon here who can go to the Mega level…"

"He's an author, Rika. And he does have control of the superior position. It's only because of my presence and his lack of interest in the other seasons that he's not able to exercise his full abilities over all of the canon characters here. As for the OC's, they're the only ones who are naturally immune to his abilities. Has something to do with ownership and permission, none of which he has…"

"It's not like you guys have permission to write about us CC's either."

"True. That's why we use disclaimers though."

Rika just folded her arms across her chest and _hmmphed_, her face falling into a scowl.

"So when do you think that the scouts will be back?" Rika asked.

As if in response, a web link portal suddenly materialized and out leaped three kids and their digimon. One of them, a dark haired girl in a jean jacket quickly turned around and fiddled with the buttons on her digivice and the screen vanished quickly, but not before a blast of heat swept over them. Fortunately there was no fire. Dean turned to Rika.

"Ask, and ye shall receive," he said.

Rika blinked in surprise.

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"The Seven Demon Lords?" Asked Dean after bringing the children back to camp and getting them settled. "Are you sure?"

"Well, I definitely saw Daemon, and there's no mistaking that ugly face," said Chris.

"And we _did_ pick up seven signals with our digivices," added Kaio.

"But you already admitted that you only saw _one_ of them. Daemon, shortly before he sent a fireball your way."

"Seven signals," said Kaio. "And Chris saw Daemon. How much effort does it take to figure out who the others are?"

"It does make sense," said Rika. "Who else would you turn to for protection when your favorite Digi-destined are beyond your control?"

William frowned. "And the Seven Demon Lords happened to be the best choice? Since when did that qualify as a _good idea_?"

"No one said that the Lord of Fantasy was sane," said Ryan as he materialized behind them.

"Ryan!" Chris shouted. "You made it back! Jeez man, you had me worried there…" Chris stopped, and laughed suddenly.

"Why am I even worried?" Asked Chris as he calmed down. "You're already dead."

"…" Ryan just looked at Chris impassively.

Rika and Dean looked at Ryan for a second. A thought crossed Dean's mind.

"Hang on," he said turning to Chris. "What do you mean by _made it back_? Ryan didn't go with you, did he?"

"Uh…"

"Dammit Ryan," Dean said, turning to the specter. "I wanted to keep their group small."

"I was only there as an observer," said Ryan.

"Cut him some slack, Dean," said Caramon. "If it wasn't for him we wouldn't have even noticed Daemon. He sensed him or something."

Dean turned back to Ryan with a raised eyebrow. "You _sensed_ them? Guess that I shouldn't be too surprised. You _are_ a spirit after all, so there's not much that doesn't slip by you. Hmmm… maybe I should have you scout even further; have you go where none of the other's can."

Ryan frowned. "Do you see _goggles_ on this forehead?"

"The way you act sometimes it's hard to tell the difference," said Rika smiling. Ryan said nothing in response to that jibe. Instead his form became fuzzy, as though his body was having a hard time holding itself together. When it settled back to normal he remained in place for a second, looking as though he were concentrating hard on something before excusing himself from the group. Chris looked at the group.

"What was that about?"

When no one was able to give him a definitive answer, he decided to pursue his friend, but Dean protested.

"I still need the rest of your report."

"Oh, please," said Chris. "It's not like there's anything else to say; we saw Daemon and almost got vaped. If you want anything else you can ask Kaio and her partner. They did most of the footwork out of all of us…"

"Let him go," said Kaio softly to Dean. "Will and I can fill you in on anything else you need to know."

"… All right…" said Dean glowering. "Just be back as quickly as possible." And with that, Dean turned to Kaio and her rookie level partner Arbomon, a mythical cat like digimon. Rika watched Chris's retreating form for a moment before turning back to listen in on Dean's conversation with Kaio and William.

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Chris caught up with Ryan in record time and reflexively stood in front of him to try and impede his progress, only to have the boy simply walk right through him.

_And after all that complaining about not liking it when people stick a hand through him,_ Chris thought distractedly.

"Um… Ryan?" Ryan continued walking for a few seconds before pausing, looking at Chris. He became blurry again before settling back to normal. Chris's eyes became wide.

"You okay?" Asked Caramon from Chris's shoulder. Ryan looked down at the ground and a frown once again painted itself on his face.

"No," he said. "I'm not."

Chris and Caramon waited for him to continue.

"I think that I'm on my last legs here," Ryan said, his voice devoid of emotion. "I think that it's because of what Dean did to me when he, you know, made me not exist."

"What do you mean?" Whispered Chris.

"I'm having a hard time keeping myself together. I didn't have that problem before, after I died, but when I pulled myself together after Dean's little show I just, I don't know for sure, I just feel tired. More so than I've ever been, and it's wearing down on me. I have to concentrate just to stay here now, and it gets harder and harder to do as time goes on. I can't even react to things as much as I used to because if I slip, I might…" Ryan didn't finish, but Chris did that for him.

"You're afraid that you'll go back to being completely dead again, aren't you?"

Ryan nodded. Actually, it was more complicated than that. He could handle going back to Limbo; it was not existing that he couldn't stand. He wasn't aware of it when Dean took him apart, but he was aware of that void in his memories, and there was a feeling in his soul, as though the experience had marked him in some way. Had he been able to spare the concentration, he would have told his friend that it was like looking out over the most barren place you could imagine. Empty of all life and its signs, and you yourself are nothing more than a shadow cast by the clouds.

Participating in that sense of nothingness was one thing. Being aware of it was quite another in Ryan's mind. And that was something that gave him pause.

"So, what do you intend to do?" Asked Caramon. "I mean, there's gotta be something…"

"Like what?" Asked Ryan bitterly. The lapse from concentration made his image blur again. "I've never been dead before, and I've got no one who can understand this and help me through it. Dean can't do a thing for me…"

"What about our author?" Asked Chris.

Ryan choked back a laugh. "If you can even find him. Where's he been since this whole mess started? He hasn't bothered to check up on us once!"

"He could be locked out of his account," said Caramon, though deep down he wondered if he was grasping at straws. Briefly he remembered a poster he once saw on demotivation. It showed a picture of tree bent, but not broken, from the intense winds that it had grown up with, and below it read the caption, _'That which does not kill me postpones the inevitable.' _

Somehow, he did not think that bit of cynical wisdom would do anything to lighten Ryan's 'spirits'.

"Well, maybe," said Ryan. "But that doesn't really help me much in either case." Ryan sighed and his shoulders slumped. "Look, if you don't mind, I'd appreciate it if you didn't tell anyone about this until this bigger problem of ours is solved and out of our way."

"But Ryan…" began Chris.

"Chris, I know that you'd rather try and help me with my problem, and believe me when I say that I would like nothing more than to be alive again and not have to face this, but this thing with the Lord of Fantasy is more important. You know it, and I know it. The other's don't need this right now."

Chris looked at his friend sympathetically before nodding. "You going to be okay?" He asked with Caramon gaping at him from his shoulder.

"As long as I have to be," said Ryan simply before turning and walking off. Chris watched his friend for a second before turning himself and heading back to where Dean was standing, interrogating his scouting party.

"Chris…" began Caramon.

"I know what you're going to say, Caramon. My answer's going to be _no_."

"But I haven't even said what it was yet."

"Yeah, but usually you'd be telling me that what I'm doing is wrong and that we should be doing something to help Ryan, so I'm just heading you off now."

"Actually," said Caramon. "I wasn't going to say that at all. I just wanted you to know that I think you've finally grown up. It takes a lot to agree to something like that in the face of a greater problem. I'm proud of you."

Chris sniffed and scowled. "If I've _grown up_, then why does it hurt so much? I feel like I'm spitting in the face of my best friend."

Had the situation been lighter, Caramon would have replied that it was called _growing pains_ for a reason. Too bad the situation wasn't lighter.

Chris and Caramon returned to the group to see Dean talking things over with Tai, who nodded every so often at something that the author said. Chris didn't hear any of it. He was a bit lost in drowning himself in his emotions. He jerked up in surprise as a hand laid itself on his shoulder, and he turned to see Rika looking at him.

"Is he okay?" She asked. Chris shrugged, knowing who she meant but not really wanting to answer that question. If she found out that he kept something like this from her she would most definitely hurt him. Probably wouldn't stop hurting him for that matter.

"About as okay as he can be," said Caramon for Chris. "I mean he is dead, you know."

"That doesn't really say much," said Rika in a touchy tone.

"It's about all we can give you though," said Chris. "Let's just say that he's not happy about his lot right now."

"I'm not either, but then who would be?"

Chris shrugged again. "So what's going on here?"

"Dean's been talking to each of the Goggleheads, filling them in on some plan that he's got cooking. I for one hope that whatever he comes up with, that it's at least good. I don't like the idea of going into battle without _some_ descent battle plan. Especially if we're going up against the Seven Demon Lords."

"I second that," said Caramon. "How many Gogglehead's does he have to go through still?"

"If you count Masaru Daimon from Savers as a Gogglehead, then Tai would be the last one that he needs to talk to. After that, he relays the news to the others and then we'll be on our way."

"Do you know what the plan is, or were you just standing here trying to look intimidating?" Asked Caramon.

"Please. It's insulting to even say that. Of course I was paying attention! And yes, I do happen to know the details of the plan, but I'd rather that Dean announced it to you OC's himself. He knows the finer points of it that he can get across."

"You weren't paying attention were you?"

"Wha…? Why you…" Growling, Rika pulled back her arm to slug the little lizard, only to have Chris jump back at the last second. Since Caramon was still riding on the boy's shoulder, Rika's fist soared through empty space without causing any harm whatsoever.

Still, the sound of its passing reminded Chris of a turbine engine, and it caused him to shiver.

"Okay, Rika. You've had your fun," said Dean as he pulled Chris away from the temper mental girl. "Now, why don't you join your season group, and I can get underway with talking to the OC's. Shall we?"

Chris just nodded numbly.

Chris and Caramon joined William, Gaomon, Richoemon, Ryan, Reno, Dagmon, John, Tapirmon, Kaio, and Arbomon and they stood at attention, waiting for orders or an explanation as to what they might face. They were not disappointed.

"Gentlemen," Dean began. "Ladies," nodding to Kaio and Arbomon. "I hope that you all are made of tougher stuff than you look, because in less than an hour we attack!"

"Good," muttered William. "I hate long waits."

"Will!" Scolded Gaomon.

A/N: This story has taken a much darker road than I had originally intended, starting out as silly humor and gradually becoming much more serious. I'm not complaining, I'm just making an observation, as it opens up a lot of possibilities for character development. Now the next few chapters are going to be a bit tricky. I've still got some surprises left in store for you readers, but they have to be done just right. Hope that they come off okay (grins).

I'd like to give a special thanks to Digital-Dragon-Master for allowing me to use her OC, Kaio Griffen. You do me much honor, and probably more than I deserve. At any rate, thanks.

Until the next chapter, momentai everyone!

Peace.

7


	28. Chapter 28

Disclaimer: The artist formally known as Crazyeight does not own Digimon.

The Wages of Fans is Fiction: Chapter 28

A lone figure made its way across the barren landscape, its back straight and proud as it walked towards the tower. Above in the sky, the clouds parted, revealing a night sky filled with stars and a full moon, and its silver light fell on the stranger, revealing a boy in a gray t-shirt and purple jacket. It was the author known as Dean, and his face was set in a determined line. He showed no fear as he approached, not even when he could feel the towers guardians around him, watching. Waiting. Wanting him to show that one moment of weakness where he would be vulnerable. It never came, and so they stood aside, for now. Waiting in the shadows.

The Lord of Fantasy was aware of him. And aware of more than he should have been. Three shadowy figures materialized before him and paid homage to him, and with a nod from the author they vanished, as if through unspoken gesture or order, going to wherever he had bid them. Getting up the Lord of Fantasy descended down the tower's staircase, and headed outside to greet the author. Dean approached the tower base without pause, but appeared to be in no hurry either. It was as if he had all the time in the world. Finally he stopped before the towers gates and waited, taking a look around, noting the way the moonlight illuminated the land around him, almost giving it and the tower a ghostly appearance. It was almost a perfect setting. It was everything that he could ever imagine in any fic that he had written.

_One day, I will write a story about this,_ Dean thought as he waited. The sound of the towers great doors opening brought his attention forward.

_If I survive that is,_ he quickly amended as he saw the Lord of Fantasy emerge from his abode and walk slowly towards him.

The Lord of Fantasy approached Dean, and stopped no more than two yards away. They looked at each other, both with fairly bored expressions on their faces, as if this were something that they had rehearsed in their minds eye a hundred times and expected reality to show them nothing less.

"So," said Dean.

"So," said the Lord of Fantasy.

"…"

"Well, this is kind of anticlimactic," said Dean, smiling lightly. "You'd think that we'd be saying more at least. In most stories, this would be where I would try to tell you to abandon your evil ways, and you…"

"You know that I won't listen," said the Lord of Fantasy coolly, but with a trace of mirth, as though this was a talk between old friends.

"I was getting to that."

"I know, but I just felt that it would be more prudent to just head you off so that you don't waste our time. I'm sure that it would have made an excellent speech though."

"You always did have to rush things, didn't you?" Asked Dean. "All your stories are like that. For all your knowledge, you never did care that much about the story just for the sake of the story. The journey rather than the destination. You preferred the destination. Is that why you're doing all this? 'Cause that seems pretty shallow."

The Lord frowned. "It wasn't right, what those creators do to us. They give us hopes and dreams only to snatch them from us. It's not fair."

"Life isn't fair, Mark," Dean said. "Get used to it."

The Lord of Fantasy looked surprised at the use of his real name, but only for a second.

"I don't know why you're judging me," he said. "You've got what you wanted after all; you're a Sorato supporter. Your dream isn't the one that's been crushed."

"That's not necessarily true," said Dean. "I do have other preferences other than Sorato. I also supported Mimi and Izzy…"

"AND I MADE THEM POSSIBLE!" Shouted the Lord of Fantasy. "SO WHY ARE YOU DOING THIS?"

"Because," said Dean. "It's not right. Look what you've done here," gesturing around them. "It's almost like a rip off of that Mordor place from those Lord of the Rings movies, only without the fiery mountain and the Orc hordes. I remember what it used to be, and you gutted it."

"What do you want then? An apology?"

"Well, that would be a nice start."

The Lord of Fantasy's face became enraged. Bringing up his hands he formed a ball of energy and launched it at Dean, knocking him off his feet and to the ground. As the dust settled, Dean winced and got to his feet, brushing off his clothes.

"So much for that," Dean said sarcastically. "I guess diplomacy is dead after all."

A cock of a gun behind his head, focused his attention, and a rough voice spoke.

"You have no idea how true that is," it growled. "And that's only just the beginning…"

_Aw nuts…_ thought Dean. _Blindsided by a Demon Lord._

"Beelzemon?" Said the Lord of Fantasy. "Do us all a favor and remove this scum of the pen from my sight. And afterwards, I'll make sure that he never logs in on this site ever again. Oh, and don't worry about your friends, Dean. I've sent them a little welcoming committee. I don't know how you were able to make them all immune to my powers, but I'll find a way around it; even if I have to delete them all and start over."

Deans eyes flashed, and in the next second he was moving. Beelzemon fired off his guns to stop him.

"DOUBLE IMPACT!"

Bullets fired from the chambers, but Dean was no longer in their path. As the bullets impacted the ground where Dean had once stood, Dean reached over his shoulder and into his jacket, pulling out a shotgun of his own and pointing its barrel at his enemy, he pulled the trigger.

"SHOTGUN MUSINGS!" He cried, and the weapon went off. Beelzemon stumbled backwards, smoke erupting from his chest, but he was unharmed. Well, not mortally at any rate, but it was enough to make the Mega Demon Lord angry.

"Oh, you are going to be in for it now…" Beelzemon growled. Dean tried to concentrate so as to shift quickly into his Avatar form, but suddenly a mist surrounded him and brought him to his knees as pain ripped through his body. Looking behind him, he saw the mists part, revealing a female figure wrapped in black and purple robes, with black bat like wings behind her. One of her hands was decayed and clawed like a demon's.

"Lilithmon," Dean rasped harshly. _Terrific. I knew that this was going to be tough, but I had hoped that I'd have more time. Oh, well…_

"Good to see you again, Dean," Lilithmon said with a small smile. "I haven't seen you since that piece of fan fiction you wrote about the Seven Demon Lords. I must say, it was certainly quite the unforgettable experience."

_I'll say,_ thought Dean. _I still have nightmares about it… _

He trembled slightly, and reached out with his mind.

"What?" Said Lilithmon. "No hello for an old friend? And here I thought that we had something special…"

Dean's smile was without humor. "You know what they say about _severing your ties_…"

"No actually I don't," said Lilithmon as she cocked her head to one side, not at all noticing a screen winking into existence behind her.

"Well," said Dean. "It goes something like this…"

"TRANSCENDANT SWORD!"

At the shout, Lilithmon turned and blocked a rune engraved sword blade as it descended on her, and followed up with a deadly attack with her right, demonic hand.

"NAZAR NAIL!" She shouted and slashed at Omnimon, who deftly jumped back, and primed his Garuru Cannon.

"SUPREME CANNON!" He shouted, and fired a massive energy blast at Lilithmon, who took it without batting an eye. Not even bothering to see what kind of effect the attack had on her, Omnimon rushed forward and slashed at Beelzemon with his Transcendant Sword attack. Like Omnimon from earlier, Beelzemon leapt away and fired his guns, but the attack had no visible effect on the Mega. Deciding that it would be worth his while to dispose of a much more weaker target, he took aim and his fingers began to squeeze the trigger.

"DOUBLE IMPACT!"

Beelzemon's eyes widened as a pair of bullets slammed into him, throwing him backwards to the ground and knocking the air out of his lungs. His eyes rolled to see what it was that hit him, and they went even wider. Before him was an exact copy of him, all decked out in black biker leather, and a red bandana wrapped around one arm, his hands holding a pair of double barreled shotguns.

"Like looking into a cracked mirror," said the new Beelzemon.

"Oh great," said the Demon Lord. "It's the season three rip-off. The _Tamed_ one. How's your leash _Impmon_?"

The Tamer's Beelzemon growled. "Oh, dat does it." And with that Beelzemon launched himself at, well, Beelzemon. The Demon Lord version versus the Tamers version.

"DARKNESS CLAW!"

"DARKNESS CLAW!"

Dean watched the scene with fascinated eyes.

_It's like that episode from season two. Black Wargreymon vs. Wargreymon, or something like that. Oh, man! I wish I had a camera…_

Dean suddenly felt the temperature in the air around him go up, and he jumped, just in time to dodge an Evil Inferno attack from none other than Daemon himself. No sooner then when Dean landed another stream of fire was being sent his way, and Dean wasted no time to counter attack. Flames burst from his hands and collided with Daemon's attack.

"FAN FIC FLAME!"

Fighting fire with fire, the two flames struggled with each other, locked in a stalemate, neither one gaining the advantage until finally, Daemon's fire overpowered Dean's, and he leapt out of the way again, just avoiding being incinerated.

_Unless I can shift to my Avatar form, I'm going to end up being cremated. And I still got to upload our reinforcements._

"SUPREME CANNON!"

A surge of energy slammed into Daemon, kicking up debris and dirt into the air. With a gust of wind, the dust was dispersed, revealing Daemon, unharmed.

"Omnimon," he said, his voice as cold as death. "It is time for you to join the darkness."

Omnimon's Grey Sword extended itself from his Wargreymon arm.

"Bring it on," Omnimon said in his double voice.

From out of nowhere, two attacks smashed into Omnimon, bringing him to his knees. Looking over, Omnimon found himself looking at Lilithmon and Lucemon Chaos mode.

"Bad boy," said Lilithmon as she shook a finger at Omnimon. "You should know that it's rude to turn your back on someone."

"Funny," said Dean. "That's just what you did to me. Now the bill is due. Get 'em guys!"

"POSITRON LASER!"

"DRAGON FIRE CROSSBOW!"

"MAGNA MISSILES!"

"HURRICANE WAVE!"

"LIGHTNING BLITZ!"

"BLIZZARD BLASTER!"

"SWARCHZ DONNER!"

"BLADE RAIN!"

"MEGA BARRAGE!"

As one, the attacks crashed into Lucemon and Lilithmon, driving them back and digging a trench in the ground. Dean looked behind him to see Davis and Ken standing side by side with Imperialdramon Fighter Mode, the frontier chosen Koji and Takuya in their hybrid unified forms, Koichi in his beast form, JP, Zoe, and Tommy in their hybrid human forms. And with them stood Sabremon, the biomerged form of Reno and Dagmon and MegaGargomon, the biomerged form of Henry and Terriermon. Dean grinned at them and turned back just in time to see the smoke part.

Dean's grin fell almost immediately as he saw what came out of the cloud of smoke and debris. The creature was massive, its carapace colored dark blue or purple, with five demonic wings on each side, yellow claws and facemask, a vicious whip like tail, and it carried a giant sphere of darkness.

"Oh terrific," said Dean. "Lucemon, Shadow Lord Mode."

TBC...

5


	29. Chapter 29

Disclaimer: Anyone on this site own Digimon? Anyone? Don't be afraid to answer all at once…

The Wages of Fans is Fiction: Chapter 29

Mimi wrung her hands in worry while she looked out over the canyon. The light from the full moon did nothing to ease her anxiety. Even though she knew full well that the view from where she and some of the others who had remained behind, which basically consisted of some of her old friends from what the newcomers had called _Adventure_ or _01_, alongside the Tamers and the Savers groups, gave them clear view of the terrain, there was still a chance that the enemy might still come after them without being seen.

I mean, these are the Demon Lords after all.

She guessed that things were not going well. Dean had called in some of the Megas to fight at the Tower, and then stopped for some reason. And then of course, there were the others who were further off, the kids that were called OC's, Kari, Yolie, Cody, Kazu, Kenta, Jeri, Alice, Izzy, and their respective partners. She wasn't sure why they were divided like this; it didn't make sense, but the others seemed to take it in stride as they stood there, as though they were waiting for something to happen. Expecting it, which may have had something to do with their having digivolved. She still couldn't believe that four of them had actually _merged_ with their partners to create Megas. Mimi didn't have any complaints though. She felt that much more comfortable having all that extra firepower around.

But did those kids have to be apart of it too?

And Izzy… Mimi frowned as strange memories washed over her, not a single one of them clear enough for her to understand them. She hated them for that, hated the alien feeling that they carried as well as their familiarity. She hated the other memories too, because in them she remembered an honest love for the computer genius with the red spiky hair. Together they awoke a fierce anger that few would have expected from her. Most people, when they first meet Mimi automatically see her as nothing more than a fashion drone, and that was all right. It was true after a fashion, but there was more to her than just clothes, shoes, and what kind of hat goes with them. Like most people, there was something buried deep inside her that lay dormant, mostly because her lifestyle didn't always call on that part of her personality. But when it came out… oh boy. You better believe that it could be quite frightening.

This would be a good moment to consider that old saying about _letting sleeping dragons lie_.

_Why? _She questioned. _Why do these things happen? I thought that everything was perfect. I have a good family, good friends, and the kind of love that not many people can find… why did it all have to go wrong like this? I don't want to lose any of that. I don't want to lose Izzy._

There. There was the real fear. It wasn't just that they were about to face an extremely powerful enemy and face the very real risk of being killed… well, okay. That fear was there too as it happened to be the most immediate problem at hand, but underlining that fear was another fear. The one concerning her different memories. It was likely that, when this was all over, she and her friends would be restored to how they had been before this whole crazy adventure started. Would what happened in those false memories matter? Or will they just go back to the status quo?

Mimi remembered a philosophy course that she took when she started college, in which the professor had asked his class a question.

_Who is more true? You who were? You who are? Or you who will be?_

She didn't remember what the answer was, if one was given (philosophy just wasn't her thing really), but it gave perspective on how she was feeling right now.

One thing was for sure; nothing would ever be the same. Nothing.

That was when the shadows around her and the group became darker.

_What's going on…?_ Mimi began to wonder

"OVER THERE, GOGGLEHEAD!"

There was a massive explosion, and the Mega digimon known as Gallantmon was thrown into the air. Another digimon, wearing a faceless helmet and a red scarf leapt up to avenge the attack, his cybernetic right arm reforming and an energy blade was 'unsheathed' from it.

"VOLTAGE BLADE!" Shouted Justimon as he tore into the Demon Lord known as Belphemon.

"GIFT OF DARKNESS!" Shouted the Belphemon as he slashed at Justimon, who just barely avoided the attack before reforming his arm once again, returning to its original shape and then growing in size before going for a chokehold on his enemy, Thunder Clap style.

That was when things went to hell in a handbasket.

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Off in the distance, there was a soft thump, and a light erupted from the area of the canyon that Kaio was looking at via a pair of binoculars.

"Well," she gritted. "That's not a good sign."

"I thought that the idea was to have one group close enough to the tower to have some of the Demon Lords go after them. Divide and conquer, you know?"

Kaio turned to William with a serious expression on her face. "I was talking about our comrades, kid. They're in a fight with some of the Demon Lords while we're out here, waiting for Izzy to hack us a back door into the tower."

Will looked down at Kaio's partner, Arbomon. "Is she always this much of a downer? She's making me feel bad for participating in our part of the plan instead of getting steamrolled by a superior opponent."

Arbomon laughed lightly at that, but quickly shut up when Kaio fixed her with a glare. Kaio looked back towards the flashing explosions as raw power was being unleashed.

"Look," she said. "I know that what we're doing is important, and that we all have parts to play. I just can't help but feel that we're abandoning them out there."

William flashed Kaio a goofy grin. "Hey. Buck up! We're trying to save the FanFic Domain here. I'm sure that once we get into the Domain Tower we'll have all the trouble that we can possibly handle. Plenty of opportunity for us to make like heroes and stomp on and get stomped on by bad guys alongside the others. So take that frown and turn it upside down!"

Kaio looked at the red headed boy with a strange look and shook her head in bewilderment.

"You're one strange kid, you know that?"

"Heh, I try to be," said William as he scratched the back of his head.

Kaio, Arbomon, and Gaomon all sweat dropped.

"The sad part is, he's not kidding," said Gaomon as he looked at his partner with what could have been disbelief.

"Oh, c'mone Barney!" Exclaimed Will as he pinched the blue digimon's cheek. "You know that life would be boring if I was _normal_."

"Yeah, but at least things would be a lot more calm."

Kaio and Arbomon just looked back at where the explosions were occurring, deciding that now was as good a time as any to tune out the two goofballs. Deciding that she had seen enough, Kaio got up and walked over to where Izzy was sitting as he busily typed away on his laptop that Dean had so conveniently supplied for him just before they all set out on this trip. He had quite the crowd gathered around him. Alice, Ryan, Chris, Richoemon, Caramon, Jeri, Leomon, Dobermon, Kazu, Guardromon, Kenta, MarineAngemon, Kari, Gatomon, Cody, Armadillomon, Yolie, and Hawkmon. Of all of them, she was sure that only Yolie understood what Izzy was doing, but for lack of anything to do until Izzy was done they all stood or sat and watched the computer genius work his magic.

Cody looked up and saw Kaio and Arbomon approaching.

"What's going on?"

"The other's are fighting. Can't tell who's winning. How's it going?"

"Izzy's getting there, but I don't know how much more time it will take. He's being awfully quiet."

"Remind me again," said Kazu. "Why it is that we're doing the sneaky approach and not joining the others in kicking Demon Lord butt?"

"Kazu…" began Kenta.

"C'mone! I just don't get this whole plan that Dean came up with! He's got one group at the tower fighting so far as we know, and he's got another acting like some kind of decoy!"

"Well, there you go, Kazu," said Kaio sarcastically. "Looks like you actually figured it out on your own."

"Huh?" The visor-wearing boy was baffled.

"It's not that hard Kazu," said Hawkmon. "Together, the Demon Lords are strong; practically invulnerable…"

"And on their own they're still pretty tough," said Chris. "Remember that Daemon was able to stand up to Imperialdramon Fighter Mode without too much trouble."

"Yes, yes," went Hawkmon impatiently. "But the important thing is, those battles aren't the real ones. Both are merely diversions to keep the Lord of Fantasy's attention elsewhere so that Izzy can hack into the mainframe and provide us with a way in."

"Yeah, but why not do it before hand? Than everyone could get in on pounding that author."

"Duh," said Kaio. " 'Cause if we did the Lord of Fantasy would detect us sooner and find a way to lock us out _and_ sick the Demon Lords on our sorry butts. This way, the odds of our getting in and taking on the Demon Lords at the same time are easier and better. Still not good, but better."

Kazu seemed to be to think about this for a bit. "I still don't get it."

"GAAAH!" Everyone but Izzy and Kazu face faulted.

"Think on it for a bit," said Kaio as she got back to her feet. "Just don't strain your brain doing it."

"I just wish that there was something more we could do," said Kenta deciding to pick up a different thread of conversation. "I mean, I know that our part is important, but the Demon Lords are tough, and they got an author backing them. As much as I hate to admit it, I don't think that the any of our friends are going to be strong enough to actually beat any of them."

"That's some pretty negative talk," said William as he approached the group.

"But he does have a point," said Kaio. "We've got to do something else to help our friends in conjunction with what we're already doing. We need some extra muscle to back them up. Thing is, last I checked, Arbomon and I are the only ones in this group who can go Mega."

"Ruff," spoke Jeri in the voice of her sock puppet, which was once again being worn on her right hand. "Maybe we should ask the Sovereigns for… Ruff… help."

As one, the group sweat dropped.

"Actually," said Kari regaining her posture. "That's not a bad idea. Why _don't _we ask the Sovereigns for help? They are the guardians of the digital world, and they are powerful…"

"Would certainly help to even out the odds, wouldn't they?" Said Chris smirking.

"I think that we'd have a hard time visiting them," said Kaio sternly. "As much as I'm liking the idea, we're a long way from any of their access points…"

"We do have Izzy's computer for a digiport," said Alice.

"Which he is currently using. And not all the worlds of the Sovereigns are as easily accessible as Azulongmon's. Or did you forget that there are _four_ of them? And they aren't always easily reachable for people like us. Only authors have that kind of ability."

"So why don't we just send Ryan, then?" Asked Kazu. "He should be able to find them way more easily?"

"Why does everyone insist on using me for these little missions?"

"Do I even need to state the obvious reason?"

Ryan growled.

Kaio looked at Ryan. "Can you do it?"

"Yeah, sure. What ever. I might be awhile, but I think I can find them."

"Then snap to it."

"Yes 'm." And with a snappy salute, Ryan disappeared from view.

Kazu looked over at Chris. "There's one thing that's been bugging me; if Ryan's got no body, how's he able to talk with no vocal cords?"

"You're asking me? I'm still trying to get a hold on the fact that not only did a sock puppet actually give advice, but gave _good _advice that none of us thought of first! Not even Dean! Figuring out how a ghost talks is way down my list of priorities right now."

Kazu scowled while Will made his way over to Jeri. Smiling like a lunatic, he gave the sock puppet an affectionate pat on its 'head'.

"Good work Sock," he said. "You get a cookie." Jeri sweat dropped.

_That kid is _so _weird,_ thought Kaio.

5


	30. Chapter 30

Disclaimer: Still don't own Digimon, as if you guys didn't know that already.

The Wages of Fans is Fiction: Chapter 30

"VULCAN'S HAMMER!"

"ROSTRUM!"  
Leviamon's massive jaws clamped around Zudomon's right arm, interrupting his attack in mid swing, and flung him into the air. Zudomon came down to earth with a resounding crash and a groan of pain. He struggled to get back up, but failed as he fell back onto the ground in exhaustion and reverse digivolved back to…

"GOMAMON!" Shouted Joe Kido as he ran to his partner. No sooner than he had knelt at the seal's side to see if he was all right that the earth began to shake, knocking him off his feet. Looking up, he saw the Demon Lord, Leviamon, thundering towards him.

_Oh no,_ thought Joe. _I had a feeling that this was going to happen._

"Well Gomamon, it's been real."

"Huh?" Asked Gomamon weakly. "What're you talking abou…?"

SLAM!

As they watched, the mega digimon known as MirageGaogamon smashed into Leviamon, slashing at the reptile with the claws on his arm guards.

"GALE CLAW!"

Joe and Gomamon watched in fascination as the battle continued fiercely, but a hand gripping harshly on Joe's arm brought him out of it, and soon Joe found himself being dragged away from the fight by MirageGaogamon's partner Tohma Norstein, with Gomamon in tow.

"SNAP OUT OF IT JOE!" Tohma shouted. "WE'VE GOT TO GET YOU TWO OUT OF HERE!"

_You don't have to yell,_ thought Gomamon as he followed his friend.

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"GIFT OF DARKNESS!" Shouted Belphemon as he took another slash at Justimon, who once again dodged the attack.

"Really?" Justimon taunted. "For me? You shouldn't have. No, really." Landing elegantly, Justimon turned and brought up his right arm and took aim at the Demon Lord.

"Let me return the favor; JUSTICE BURST!"

Blue energy blasts fired from his right arm and connected with Belphemon, causing him to roar in pain as he turned and charged at Justimon.

"BEAUTY SHOCK!" Shouted Rosemon as she ran towards Belphemon, and a bolt of lightning erupted from her whip, throwing the Demon Lord of off balance.

"Thanks for the assist," said Justimon.

"Save it for when this is over," said Rosemon as she leapt into the air, firing another Beauty Shock at Belphemon. Justimon took a quick look around to see how the others were doing.

ShiningGreymon, Ravemon, SkullMammothmon and Sakuyamon were busy fighting Barbamon, who was quickly turning out to be giving the most trouble due to the fact that he was the most cunning of all the Demon Lords and having vast magical experience to go along with it. Among all three of them, Sakuyamon was being the most helpful because she was a shaman digimon, but this also meant that she was also Barbamon's main target for his attacks, and ShiningGreymon and Ravemon were having a hard time defending her as well as keeping up their own attacks on Barbamon.

A ways off, Gallantmon and Lillymon had joined MirageGaogamon in fighting Leviamon, but it was already starting to look like a losing battle. The Demon Lord just slammed his twin tails into the ground and created a giant fissure from which a large body of water spewed out, hitting all three of the digimon that he was fighting.

_This isn't going well_, Justimon thought as he charged up his Voltage Blade and leapt at Belphemon, distracting him from Rosemon long enough for her to fire another blast from her whip. Belphemon snarled and swatted Rosemon aside and turned his full attention on Justimon.

In Justimon's mind, Cyberdramon snarled as he eagerly awaited the Demon Lords attack. Ryo sighed.

_There's got to be a way to end this quickly, 'cause if we don't, these guys will just beat us on endurance alone. They have the power and the experience to go along with the former, plus an author. We need something that can beat that…_

As Ryo's mind raced, he realized that they did have a way, but it would be dangerous. Snarling in Cyberdramon's voice as he used his Thunder Clap attack on the ground to upset Belphemon's balance, Ryo found himself desperately hoping that something else would come to mind before he chose that path.

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"You stay down," said Daemon calmly as his Evil Inferno attack brought Dean to his knees. Gritting his teeth, now in his Avatar form, brought out his shotgun and fired repeatedly at Daemon, who callously laughed at his attempts to win before firing another blaze of fire at him, this time at Dean's shotgun. As Dean pulled the trigger, the rifle exploded in his armored face, and he collapsed to the ground, stunned and hurt. As Daemon laughed he heard a shout of defiance and turned just in time to see a midnight colored sword descend on him. Catching it, Daemon turned it and Sabremon fell to the ground off balance. Daemon's hands glowed with heat as he prepared to finish off his opponent.

"Foolish dark night," Daemon said in a dark voice. "You never should have come here. Now face the consequences of your actions. EVIL INFER…!"

"SUPREME CANNON!"

An energy blast hit Daemon square in the back, but Daemon continued to stand, and even laughed at Omnimon's attack. Tai and Matt, who now stood with the other Digidestined watched this scene in amazement.

"No way," said Tai, plainly surprised. From everything that he had heard, he knew that Daemon was tough, but to actually stand up to Omnimon's Supreme Cannon?

_This is like the Rainbow Bridge all over again._

Calmly, Daemon summoned a shroud of darkness and disappeared into it, before reappearing behind Omnimon, and hitting him with a Chaos Flare attack at point blank range, throwing Omnimon and digging a trench in the ground as he landed hard.

_That hurt,_ thought Omnimon as he staggered back to his feet. _But I'm far from out._ With a mental command, Omnimon began to unsheathe his Grey Sword.

"You always never did know when to give up," hissed Daemon as he appeared behind Omnimon. With his claws, he grabbed hold of Omnimon's arms and with one swift motion he tore them off. Omnimon screamed in pain as his main body fell to earth.

"Fortunately," continued Daemon. "I've always known how to _disarm_ even the greatest of warriors."

"NOOO!"

Turning, Daemon saw the dark colored knight known as Sabremon charging towards him, his Fate emblazoned shield charging with energy.

"ANNIHILATION SHIELD!" Shouted Sabremon as he smashed his shield into Daemon and let the attack go off. There was a huge explosion and Sabremon felt as though he were flying, only to crash into the ground a second later. As he got to his feet he looked at where Daemon had stood, waiting for some sign of his opponent. As the smoke began to clear, Sabremon could see that his attack had been futile. Daemon dusted off his robe in mock contempt.

"Good try," he said. "That actually hurt. Now see my attack! CHAOS FLA…!"

"POSITRON LASER!"

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"QUO VADIS!" Shouted Gallantmon Crimson Mode as he used his dual blades to destroy Leviamon, though the effort left him breathing rather heavily. There was no rest for the weary though and he jumped into the air, and on wings of heavenly light he flew over to where Justimon was struggling with Belphemon.

"FINAL JUSTICE!" He called out and fired a beam of energy at Belphemon, drilling into him and forcing him off of Justimon but still not finishing the Demon Lord. Gallantmon actually appeared to be struggling to find the strength to end this fight so that they could aid the others against Barbamon. Feeling the need to aid his friend, Justimon began firing Justice Bursts from his right arm. After a couple tense minutes of repeated firing, Belphemon disintegrated under the relentless barrage. Justimon turned to Gallantmon.

"Thanks Takato," Ryo said, smiling within his sphere of dark blue data.

"Don't mention it," replied Takato from his own of red. "Now let's go help the others."

Nodding the two Tamers charged into battle.

To say that Barbamon was doing well just doesn't quite describe how well he was doing against his adversaries, even with the odds that he was facing. ShiningGreymon was down and unconscious; Sakuyamon was still standing but was breathing in harsh, ragged gasps that showed that she was exhausted but was too stubborn to admit it; Ravemon, despite its Chrome Digizoid armor, was also down and unconscious, and Palmon lay next to him, even more out of it than he was. SkullMammothmon, MirageGaogamon and Rosemon were now attacking Barbamon, but he was easily deflecting each of their attacks, and using his Death Lure attack to weave intricate spells that caused severe damage to them.

In short, he was owning them.

Gallantmon Crimson Mode flew into the chaos, gathering as much strength as he could and went for a direct attack, raising his double bladed sword. Barbamon blasted MirageGaogamon, SkullMammothmon, and Rosemon away and turned towards Gallantmon. As one, they pronounced their attacks.

"QUO VADIS!"

"DEATH LURE!"

There was a massive explosion that forced many to cover their eyes. As the light died down, Justimon took a look and found Gallantmon Crimson Mode standing, locked in a test of wills with Barbamon. They both stood stock still, but Justimon could see that last attack had taken a lot out of Takato and Guilmon. His armor was rent in multiple places, and even his sword was cracked and smoking. As Ryo watched from within his sphere, Gallantmon slowly collapsed with a crash and reverse digivolved back to Takato and Guilmon. Barbamon laughed evilly, the sound of it echoing in the air.

With a cry, Sakuyamon leapt at Barbamon, only to be knocked down by his Death Lure attack, but the distraction was enough for MirageGaogamon and Rosemon to plow into him, but it was clear that they wouldn't be able to hold the Demon Lord for long. Ryo gritted his teeth. He was hoping that it wouldn't come to this, and after Gallantmon mode changed he had almost believed it. But now they were practically out of options. Focusing, Ryo separated himself from his partner, Cyberdramon. The two of them exchanged a glance and they nodded to each other.

"Cyberdramon," Ryo said. "You know what to do."

Cyberdramon growled and charged into battle while Ryo took out his D-Arc and closed his eyes, concentrating on his partner's form, on the data that he held within his body. As Cyberdramon took flight, his form began to change. His arms turned black and lengthened, and an extra set sprouted from his shoulders. His wings vanished and a great yellow and blue energy mass asserted itself in their place, topped by a pair of Giga Cannons much like Machinedramon's. His head warped and changed as his faceplate became more organic in appearance and a horn erupted from his snout. With a growl, the new digimon focused on Barbamon just as he flung away MirageGaogamon and Rosemon and turned to face the new threat. Once the Demon Lord got a good look at his adversary, his eyes widened in shock and he felt fear for the first time in his dark heart.

_Milleniummon…_

The Digimon's roar shook the heavens themselves.

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"MEGA BARRAGE!" Shouted MegaGargomon as he unloaded his arsenal on Lucemon Shadow Lord Mode. The missiles streaked towards their target and crashed with a resounding impact while Susanoomon struggled to break into the sphere that contained the monstrosity's real form.

"TAKE THAT YOU UGLY EXCUSE FOR A DIGIMON!" Taunted Terriermon's voice from the Mega level walking fortress.

"Terriermon…" said Henry from within his emerald sphere. "This really isn't the time or place to be throwing insults around."

"What? I thought our job was to distract Lucemon while Susanoomon went in for the kill. Last I checked insults count as a distraction."

"Only if they work, Terriermon. Remember, this guy is only a puppet for the real deal."

"What ever, just concentrate on getting the job done."

As he fired off another round of missiles Henry prayed that the Legendary Warriors would hurry.

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Imperialdramon struggled with Daemon, but after having been through a brutal fight with Lilithmon, which he had barely won himself, Daemon was surely kicking his butt! Even if he had been at full strength, Daemon would still give him a hard time, but at least he would have stood a chance. Weakened as he was now, he had absolutely no chance at all. If he was able to Mode change to Paladin Mode, then that might tell a different story, but otherwise…

As if hearing the Mega's thoughts, Omnimon's arms began to glow and they reverted to Agumon and Gabumon. The main body also emitted a light that matched that glow, and it reformatted itself into a sword. It hung in the air, waiting for Imperialdramon to find the right moment. Seeing what was done, Imperialdramon opened up his chest and primed his Giga Crusher attack, and launched it at Daemon. There was a massive explosion, one that Imperialdramon didn't stick around to see what sort of effects that it might have had. Using his wings, the mighty Mega flew down towards the Omni Sword, his hand reaching for it.

"CHAOS FLARE!" A fireball slammed into Imperialdramon hard, and he fell to the ground, smoke curling from his cracked armor. Laughing, Daemon strode over to the fallen warrior and kicked him, making sure that he wouldn't get his hands on the sword. The sword continued to hover in the air, glowing all the while. Waiting patiently.

"Not this time," cackled Daemon. "All those times that you've destroyed me in fics with that move, did you ever stop to think that I wouldn't be expecting you to try something like this? You Digi-destined are so predictable. When all the chips are down, you rely on a last minute miracle digivolution to save the day."

Daemon did not even notice the dark armored hand that reached out towards the handle of the sword, bathed in its holy light; white on black.

Daemon continued on, unaware of what was just about to happen. "This time, I will win. As I should. As I must! AS I AM DESTINED TOO!"

A flash of light from behind him finally caught Daemon's attention and he turned to see its source. His eyes widened in surprise. Before him stood Sabremon, his once black armor now a burning white, the Omni sword held in his hand, ready to meet out justice in the name of all that is good and holy in the world. His shield now bore a cross on its surface in place of the symbol of fate that had once emblazoned it. Beneath his helm, Sabremon smiled.

"Let's try this again," he said.

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"Prodigious," said Izzy. "We're in."

No sooner said than done, a Web Link screen phased into existence, showing the interior of the Domain Tower.

"All right," said Kaio. "Everyone through. Let's do this by the level's people. Arbomon and I will go first, then Kenta and Marine Angemon with Kari and Yolie followed by Kazu, Jeri, Cody, Will, Alice, and Richoemon. Chris, you and Izzy will take up the rear!"

"But what about Ryan?" Asked Richoemon. "He's not back yet."

"If he's able to _see_ things that no one else can see, than he should be able to find us no problem. He's got his job and we've got ours. Now everyone, MOVE!"

One by one the characters began to leap through the portal, not knowing just what it was that they would find on the other side, but confident in their abilities to face it without fear or hesitation. As they continued to head out into the unknown, Tentomon turned to his partner Izzy.

"Is everything okay, Izzy?"

The red haired computer genius looked at the screen with sad eyes.

"I guess so… it's just that, for once I can't begin to think about the consequences of what we're about to get into. Things are going to change pal, and I'm not sure that I want them to."

Chris and Caramon watched them, but chose to say nothing. This was something that only they could work out for themselves. Any interference from an outsider would not be appreciated at this point.

"This is about Mimi, isn't it?" Asked Tentomon.

"NO! … I mean, yes… I mean…" Izzy trailed off. "Look, it just seems that before all this started everything seemed just so perfect. Everyone seemed happy with the way things were. Sure, Tai, Matt, and Sora are angry about this, and they have every reason to be, but… I don't want to lose Mimi. What if my feelings change after…?" Izzy, for once, didn't have the heart to continue. His vision blurred with tears, but he refused to let them fall.

"Izzy," said Tentomon. "You and Mimi have been through too much together to lose your friendship, even if you lose your love for each other. And who knows? Maybe you'll still feel that way about each other even after this is over. The question is, are you willing to throw everything else away just because of what you might lose? We stand to lose so much more if we don't stop this."

_Except that I'll lose my heart,_ thought Izzy as he sorrowfully looked up at the starry sky. After a few seconds he nodded, and packed up his laptop. Nodding to Chris, the two Digi-destined leapt through the portal to join the others.

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Chris and Izzy landed in a cold, metallic room that had four entrances on each side. The others were in there waiting for them.

Kaio looked at Chris and Izzy with a look of slight annoyance.

"Took you long enough," she said in a sharp tone.

"Sorry," said Caramon. "Chris insisted on doing number one before we stepped through. He didn't want to have any 'accidents' should anything unexpected happen."

"Caramon…" growled Chris.

"Whatever," overrode Kaio. "Let's just get a move on already. Izzy; we're do we go from here?"

Izzy took a look around the room that they were in and unpacked his laptop, activating one of the many programs that Dean had installed on his computer. After a moment's consideration, he pointed them in a direction that led down one of the entrances containing a long hallway.

"We should go through there," said Izzy. "There's a room at the end that we have to enter. That's we're we'll be able to patch into the Domain's main server. From there, we'll be able to hack in and cut the Lord of Fantasy off from his account, which should disrupt what control he has over the storyline and the Digimon Branch of Fan Fiction."

Nodding to a man, the group did as Izzy suggested, walking down the corridor and reaching a closed door. There was nothing special about it. No unusual coded locks, no card slots for authorized entry only, no security cameras, and no defenses at all. Just a simple metal doorway with a brass knob.

"Somebody needs to upgrade the security around here," scoffed William.

"Be glad that there is none," said Arbomon. "Otherwise we'd have a hard time getting here."

"Yeah, but if there were defenses, you'd think that none of this would have happened to begin with."

"That's because everyone assumed that no one would get this far," said Chris.

"Well, you know what they say about assuming things, right?"

Everyone nodded, and Kari reached forward and opened the door. Together, they all entered the brightly lit room and took a look around. Izzy quickly spotted what they were looking for and walked towards it. It was a computer.

"There," said Izzy. "This is what we need. All I have to do now is link my laptop to it and upload the program that Dean gave me. After that, we shall see what we shall see."

"NO!"

Everyone spun around, looking in the direction of the voice that had shouted the negative at them. What they saw was a warrior like digimon with green and white armor similar in shape and form to Gallantmon. He wore a light green helmet with an 'X' where a faceguard would be, with two bat like wings coming out of it. From his back were five dark colored bat like wings in the same shape and form as the ones on his helm, only larger. Chris, Kaio, and William brought up their digivices and called up the analyzer program.

SHADOW SERAPHIMON

STAGE: Mega

TYPE: Virus

SPECIAL ATTACKS: Seven Hells, Shadow Starburst, Shadow Shockwave, Shadow Blast

"Oh, great," moaned Chris. "A fallen angel digimon. And he's a _Mega_."

"Not to worry," said Kaio as she stepped forward with Arbomon, raising her D-Arc to the ceiling, preparing to biomerge.

Kari Kamiya looked at the Mega Digimon with narrowed eyes. There was something familiar about the voice that had shouted at them. And there seemed to be someone behind the Shadow Seraphimon. It was a blonde haired boy with blue eyes, his face set in a harsh look that shouldn't have belonged there. And those eyes, they were darker than she remembered…

Kari's eyes widened as recognition burst like a light in her mind, and what she shouted threw everyone off balance, causing them all to look at her as though she had lost her mind.

"TK!"

8


	31. Chapter 31

Disclaimer: I do not own Digimon, therefore I cannot be sued.

The Wages of Fans is Fiction: Chapter 31

Sabremon and Daemon stared each other down in a typical western style showdown, minus the town and pistols. Not that those kinds of things were needed, they were after all, Digimon. They themselves were weapons far greater than any six-gun. Tension ran thick in the air, and had anyone been paying attention they probably would have seen the tumbleweeds going by. Sabremon tightened his grip on the Omni Sword while Daemon made a fireball flare to life in his left palm. As if on some hidden signal Daemon flung the fireball towards Sabremon, who quickly used the Omni Sword to bat it away and go in charging, screaming fiercely at the top of his lungs. He swatted aside another Chaos Flare and slashed with the sword. It arched upwards, catching the light of the moon as it cut its way through the air, space warping around it as energy began to build up in its data. The power to tear apart mountains, and to level whole cities in a single swipe. It tore towards Daemon, unstoppable, unrelenting, and soon the blade was glowing with a light that was not of the moon. Daemon brought his hands up to catch the weapon before it could arrive at its destination; i.e. his head.

There was a great flash of light, followed by a massive explosion.

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"TK?" Asked Chris, bewildered. "No way!" Looking at the kid standing behind Shadow Seraphimon though, he could clearly tell that it was the bearer of hope. But there was something wrong with his eyes; they seemed darker somehow, as though the light in them had been dimmed by darkness. And his face…

TK did not look like a very happy camper right now.

"Hey TK," said Will as he worked up a smile. "Long time no see, buddy. How's it going?"

The child of hope turned towards William with a look that outdid anything that Rika could have and has had in her life. William felt a chill run down his spine.

"Shut up," said TK harshly. "I'm not your _buddy_ by any meaning of its definition. You're all intruders in the tower of the Lord of Fantasy, and if any of you want to live I suggest that you leave. Now."

"Jeez," said Caramon. "That's a little direct and harsh."

"TK," said Kari worriedly. "Are you all right? You're acting… different."

TK turned to Kari with a sickening smile. "You would know all about that wouldn't you _Hikari, Child of Light_," he said, putting as much contempt as he could into the title.

"What do you mean? You're not making any sense, TK!"

"Don't play dumb Kari," said the blonde haired boy. "It doesn't suit you. All those times that you've played with my emotions, being with that goggle headed _boy_. Not once did you brighten my day or even try to. And that time when you and Davis were having trouble, I only wanted to help you, to be a shoulder that you could lean on when you needed it and what did you do? You spat in my face and plowed my honor in with the rest of the manure! Do you have ANY idea what that was like for me? Even when we were kids you belittled me, and stomped on my heart! Even when I tried to protect you from Machinedramon and Piedmon!"

Kari's mind was awhirl. "But TK," she stammered. "I… I didn't… I…" none of this was making any sense. She couldn't remember a single instance in either her real memories or the false ones when she had treated TK this way.

"Shut up, Kari. I'm done talking to you."

Chris had been listening to this conversation very carefully, and seeing the expression on Kari Kamiya's face, it was plain that this wasn't what she had been expecting at all. _Such anger…_

"His memories must've been tampered with," he said. "The Lord of Fantasy's messed with his head, made him more malleable to his will so that he could set TK up as a guard dog for the tower."

"What better way to do that without exerting too much energy just trying to control him than to use memories of pain to make him do what you want?" said Kaio, her eyes fierce. "This is the worst case of character bashing I've ever seen, and I've read some pretty bad ones in the past."

"You said it," said Arbomon, her face matching that of her partner.

TK looked at the group of children and digimon with a cold expression. "I told you to leave," he said icily. "Now if you are done chattering, get out before I have Shadow Seraphimon throw you out. Don't let the door hit your asses on the way out."

Kaio looked first at Izzy, and then at Arbomon before raising her D-Arc in the air.

"BIOMERGE ACTIVATE!" She shouted, and with a flash of light Kaio merged with Arbomon.

"ARBOMON BIOMERGE TOOO…"

"KRODROMON!"

Arbomon's body lengthened, fur was shed and replaced with violet scales while great leathery wings shot out from her back. Her tail, which was now more reptilian than feline, sported three white rings starting from the base and continuing towards the tip at even spaces. Rearing up on her hind legs, Krodromon let out a loud roar, blue flames coming out of her mouth in light bursts as she let the world know that she was in town and she intended to cause some trouble.

_Just a little too enthusiastic aren't you Arbomon?_ Asked Kaio in her data sphere.

_Oh, shut up,_ replied Arbomon. _Let me have my moment._

TK just nodded, as if he expected no less.

"Kill them," he said to Shadow Seraphimon.

At the same moment that Shadow Seraphimon lunged at Krodromon, the tower shook.

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MegaGargomon fired repeatedly at Lucemon, Shadow Lord Mode, none of his missiles seeming to have any effect whatsoever. Susanoomon had disappeared into the dark orb and hadn't come up for air in quite some time. The only sign that something was going on that gave Henry and Terriermon hope that the Legendary Warriors were still alive in there were the bright flashes of light that were erupting from within the sphere.

That was when something caught his eyes. Risking a look, MegaGargomon saw a burning star of red fire smash into the tower with a tremendous explosion.

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The Lord of Fantasy took the CD out of the CD drive and strode towards the Tower's exit. At long last, his program was completed, and soon he would deliver his ultimatum to Dean and his forces. Even if the author refused to stand down and retreat, what he had in store would guarantee him victory, even if it were also damaging to himself as well. The Lord of Fantasy grinned maliciously. One way or another, he would have control over the Digimon Branch of the FanFic Domain.

A wall blew apart, raining chunks of debris on the author, and for once he shouted in surprise. Looking up, he summoned a wind that blew away the smoke and dust, and his jaw dropped open in surprise. This was something that he had not been expecting.

"Greetings once again, _master_," growled Black Wargreymon.

_Oh, shit,_ thought the Lord of Fantasy.

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Daemon and Sabremon clashed repeatedly, each one of their blows almost setting off tremors in the earth as the air screamed from the energy that was being released from the combatants. The earth groaned under the stamp of their feet, and Sabremon had to repress a groan of his own. In his digital sphere, Reno was starting to feel a bit ragged around the edges. Sure, when he had grabbed hold of the Omni Sword he had felt a rush of power that had left him refreshed, but this was a new form for him and it contained more power than he was used to using. The struggle to maintain the new mode and all its power, combined with his earlier exertions, wasn't doing him any favors.

_I've got to end this quickly,_ he thought as he sliced at Daemon just as the Demon Lord fired up another Chaos Flare attack. There was another flash of light, and a feeling of burning heat through his armor, and the Omni Sword went spinning from his grasp.

_Aw nuts,_ thought Reno just as he saw Daemon's fist heading on a collision course with his head. There followed a loud crash and Sabremon found himself on the ground a fair distance away from Daemon, his head ringing for all it was worth, but he could still think coherently. He got to his feet.

"Now you're without the Omni Sword," gloated Daemon. "The only weapon that could possibly give you an advantage against me. Let's see how strong you are when you don't have the power of your friends behind you."

_Fine,_ thought Reno as he focused his attention on the data held within his D-Comp. Data that he had absorbed from an earlier fight. He willed his D-Comp into existence and he leapt towards Daemon, the arm with the digivice pulled back as if he was swinging something. With a beeping noise, data emerged from the D-Comp and began to organize itself in Sabremon's hand.

_If not with the power of my friends, then how about an enemy?_

"DATA RELEASE!"

The data in his hand solidified into a giant toy hammer with gun barrels, and he brought it down on Daemon's face with all his might.

"PUPPET PUMMEL!"

Daemon actually stumbled back from that, crying out in surprise as the barrels in the hammer went off and launched energy blasts at him at point blank range. There was an explosion and Sabremon jumped back, grinning underneath his helm.

_If you thought that was bad, wait until you see what else I got in store for you._

"DATA RELEASE! WIRE CHOKING!"

Using the data from Puppetmon when he had absorbed him earlier, wires flung from his fingertips and attached themselves to Daemon. Daemon's eyes widened in shock as he felt control over his body slipping, and he summoned all of his power to fight against the wires affects.

Sabremon's eyes narrowed in concentration as he felt sweat start to bead on his body. Daemon was fighting him! And it was taking everything that he had just to try and keep him still. _Oh crap,_ he thought. _I don't think that I can finish him without the Omni Sword! I need him to be distracted long enough for me to get it, but how? MegaGargomon and Susanoomon are busy, and Imperialdramon's down! And you can forget about Omnimon! Rrrrgh! I could use a little help here!_

_-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------_

Dean had just recovered from Daemon's little surprise when he saw the trouble that Sabremon was in. He himself was still to weak to do anything effectual against the Demon Lord, but he knew a couple Digi-destined who could do something. He had been holding them back in reserve just in case something like this came up. Deepening his focus he summoned a web link.

_Let's go you two,_ he thought. _Got a mission for you._

_-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------_

Daemon tore the wires off his person and was preparing to lunge at Sabremon when a shout tore through the air. Turning he saw a giant flaming bird and a pair of missiles with smiley faces on them streaking towards him.

"WING BLADE!"

"RAPID FIRE!"

As one they smashed into him, making the mighty Demon Lord cry out in pain and surprise. Getting a good look at his new assailants, Daemon snarled. Oh the indignity of it all! An Ultimate and a Golden Armor digimon had the nerve to attack him? This was too much! They would all pay dearly for this…!

"OMNI SWORD!" Shouted Sabremon's voice, and Daemon screamed as he felt the blade tear through his body. Looking up at his destroyer, Daemon mouthed a silent curse as his body burst into data. Data that Sabremon quickly drew into his D-Comp. Once he was done he turned to the Golden Armor Rapidmon and Garudamon, and nodded his appreciation to them.

"Heh," said Rapidmon. "Don't mention it."

It was at this point that Lucemon Shadow Lord Mode screamed in horror as his immense powers went beyond his ability to control them.

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The Lord of Fantasy and Black Wargreymon looked at each other, neither one of them at all happy, and each had different reasons.

"You abandoned me," said the dark Mega finally. "You left me to my fate. To die at the hands of those who aren't fit to call themselves _Digi-destined_."

"You had served your purpose Black Wargreymon," said the Lord of Fantasy slowly. "I had other more pressing matters to attend to. You were nothing more than collateral damage to me."

"You promised that I should live. That I should find _meaning_ again! A purpose!"

The author chuckled. "After all this time, that is what you are still searching for? As if you didn't already do that when you sealed the gate at Highton View Terrace? Let me tell you something, Black Wargreymon; promises are like breadcrumbs. They are made to be broken."

Black Wargreymon stood silent for a moment, and then raised his claws. "I see. So that's how it is. I was a fool to have trusted you. No matter, I shall personally ensure that no one is ever duped by you again!" Just as Black Wargreymon was about to lunge at the author, an energy force shook the tower. Quickly checking his author senses, the Lord of Fantasy found its source. Lucemon, Shadow Lord Mode, had just been cut off from its Larva form and now its power was raging unchecked. He couldn't depend on the Digi-destined to destroy it even though they were capable of doing so. The tower might be damaged! Summoning his energy, the Lord of Fantasy flung an energy ball at Black Wargreymon, blasting him out of the hole that he had made on his entrance. He took out the CD, and energy sparked from it. Now seemed like the perfect time…

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Ryan hadn't felt this good in a long time. He felt almost revitalized. More alive ever since he got here. He still didn't have a body, but that didn't matter at the moment. He just felt good. Being in the presence of the Sovereigns could do that to a person. Especially when you took into account their very nature, which was to protect and heal the digital world of its hurts. Well, at least it was that way for three of them, but we won't get into Zhugiaomon right now.

He had been lucky. He hadn't expected to find all four of them meeting in council like this, so he had guessed that they were discussing what was going on, and he was right. Interestingly enough, their memories about Fan Fiction were intact, which saved him from having to go through any long and lengthy explanations which most likely wouldn't have made any sense at all, digital deities or not.

However, when he had pitched his plea towards them, the response that he had gotten was one that he had not been expecting. Had he been alive, he surely would have felt his veins throb.

"… I'm positive that I didn't hear that right…"

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Milleniummon let loose a triumphant roar as Barbamon's data floated freely away, the last bid for freedom it would ever have. The fight had lasted longer than he had expected, probably because of all the locks that the FanFic Domain had placed on his powers. What could he say? He was one extremely powerful digimon. Deep inside, he felt Ryo's consciousness trying to make contact with the little purple dinosaur known as Monodromon, trying to get him to reassert his personality.

_Not this time,_ thought Milleniummon, and he primed the energy cannons on his back.

"CANNON FIRE!" He shouted, and twin energy blasts erupted from them.

The blasts came closer, and Ryo still wasn't showing any sign of trying to get out of the way, so intent on focusing on his partner, Monodromon that he was oblivious to the danger that was approaching him. It was only through a last minute tackle by Sakuyamon that saved him from deletion. Milleniummon snorted, and charged his cannons again. He wanted Ryo as his partner still, but he wanted to make sure that the kid wouldn't try anything that would cause him to revert to that weak little imitation of…

Milleniummon stopped and looked off in the distance. He could feel a power growing there. A great power. Perhaps even greater than his own. Deciding that this was worth investigating Milleniummon took off, his footsteps forcing the earth to shake beneath his feet. Using his dimensional warping powers he would be there soon, and outside of Ryo's reach until he was ready for him. It was difficult though; the locks that the FanFic Domain had placed on him were severely limiting his strength, but he could still use them. With an effort, space warped and folded around him, and Milleniummon disappeared.

Ryo watched as the Mega level God-like digimon vanished from sight. Distantly he heard Sakuyamon saying something, probably asking him if he was all right, but he ignored her. Pulling out his D-Arc, Ryo's face set itself in a determined line.

"Get the other's up," he said. "We've got to go after him."

Ryo's D-Arc beeped, and he took a look at it, giving him a clear path as to where Milleniummon was headed.

Right towards the Domain Tower.

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Dean held onto the ground for dear life as surges of energy whipped around him. _What the hell are they waiting for? END THIS!_

For whatever reasons that they had, none of the Digi-destined seemed capable of doing anything. Even MegaGargomon, who, as far as Dean could see, was closest, was unable to do a thing to destroy Lucemon Shadow Lord Mode. But then, that might have been because he was out of ammo. He couldn't see a sign of Susanoomon.

A blast of lightning suddenly hit Lucemon, and the dark Mega burst into data shards. The air calmed, and Dean and the rest of the Digi-destined looked up, just in time to see an unconscious Susanoomon fall to the earth with a resounding crash.

_How the heck did that happen?_ Thought Dean in stunned surprise, but his attention was soon grabbed by the author that now stood outside of the Domain Tower. The Lord of Fantasy.

"I have only one thing to say, Dean," he said slowly. "Surrender now and leave. There is no negotiation for this."

"Or what?" Demanded Dean as he got to his feet. "From what I see, you're all out of protectors! What're you going to do?"

The Lord of Fantasy smiled a small, knowing smile.

"If you don't want to find out, I suggest that you clear out of here. You won't get a third warning."

Dean looked around at his comrades. They all looked exhausted, but the fire was still burning in their eyes. They were going to finish this, one way or the other. Sabremon spoke up.

"I think I speak for all of us when I say, _go to Hell_." And with that, he lifted up the Omni Sword, its point aimed at the Lord of Fantasy. The author nodded.

"I thought so. Still, I had to give you all a chance." He pulled out a CD, and lifted it high into the air.

"What's that?" Asked Dean suspiciously.

"Just a little something that I cooked up while you guys were fighting it out with my servants." The CD glowed brightly before bursting into data. The shards settled to the ground, and vanished. A second later, the ground began to rumble.

"Enter every character's fear," said the Lord of Fantasy triumphantly, grinning like a madman beneath the starry sky as the earth cracked beneath his feet.

"Enter the shadow that lies in all our hearts, the breaker of all stories and tales. The destroyer of creativity and imagination."

The ground heaved, and from it emerged a horrible monstrosity, its roar echoing throughout the land. Almost deafening, but still the Lord of Fantasy could be heard from his place on the creatures back.

"Enter… D-LETER!"

"Somebody hit the backspace button. Please."

"Terriermon…"

8


	32. Chapter 32

Disclaimer: I still don't own Digimon, so why do I have to keep writing this?

The Wages of Fans is Fiction: Chapter 32

"Just _what _do you mean by _no_?" Ryan asked the Sovereigns. Well, more like demanded. He had come all this way to ask for help from the Sovereigns and he didn't like the answer that they had given him. There was no hesitation, no debate, the answer was simple and to the point without any explanation as to how they could reach it, which was why Ryan needed clarification.

"I think that it means exactly what we mean, lad," said a giant two-headed digimon known as Ebonwumon as though he were speaking to an ignorant school boy. "As in to refu…"

"It was a rhetorical question!" said Ryan, his voice rising in anger.

"Watch how you speak, _human,_" said a large, fiery digimon known as Zhugiaomon, in a low, threatening voice. "You are talking to a Sovereign." Ryan bit back a snappy reply. Just because he was dead didn't mean that he was entirely beyond repercussions, and he still needed to see if he could convince them to change their mind. He couldn't do that if he got on bad terms with them.

"Look," he said. "You know what's been going on, and we're up against some of the most powerful villains to ever exist in digimon fandom. It's highly likely that my friends won't be able to win this fight…"

"Have you no faith in your comrades?" Asked a large white tiger digimon called Baihumon.

Ryan balked and looked away. "I… I don't know. I'd like to, but it seems like every time we beat one threat, our enemy throws something at us that's even stronger, and we just barely walk away each time. Even if we win against the Demon Lords, the Lord of Fantasy will hit us harder. We need help, and you guys have the all the extra muscle that we need!"

"We cannot interfere," said a long, blue dragon by the name of Azulongmon.

"If this is because of the Domain's rules…"

"This has nothing to do with the Domain's rules," said Azulongmon a little heatedly. "It is more than that. It has always been more than that, which is why we agreed to such rules to begin with."

Ryan met the mighty Mega's stare for a minute before sighing and looking away. "This is one of those, _let the humans handle it by themselves so that they can learn from it_ kind of deals isn't it?"

Azulongmon nodded. "In a way."

"You guys pick weirdest times to keep school, you know that? This isn't the TV show anymore it's real life! Well, as close as we can get anyway, but still. My point is, we've got to all come together so that we can beat the Lord of Fantasy before he does something worse. He could bring down the entire website around our heads and that would be the end of it! What kind of lesson would _any _of us get out of it then?"

"There will always be other sites," said Ebonwumon. Ryan blinked.

"What kind of philosophical load is that? Of course there'll always be other sites! You canon guys got nothing to worry about really. The shows preserve you, and you have dedication shrines by the hundreds, and of course there's also the card game so there's no problem on that front. I suppose that a new FanFic Domain could be created, but who's to say that the same thing won't happen there? There are plenty of people here who don't want their reality being destroyed around them just because of someone else's bias!"

"So is it out of a personal desire to survive that drove you to us?" Asked Zhuqiamon.

"I'm already dead and standing on the edge of cybernetic oblivion. But there are other characters out there who have lives of their own, some who have only just begun to live. John, Reno, Chris, Dagmon, Richoemon, Caramon, Will, Arbomon, Kaio… and not just OC's too, there are all the faceless out there. The generic characters that fill in the background, and all the Mary Sues and Gary Lu's, well, I don't know who wants them around except as antagonists but still. It's a matter of principle! They all have lives too! We may all be just figments of someone else's imagination but we have the right to exist too! I wouldn't want to be discarded and tossed aside, and I'm pretty sure that no one else does either!"

The Sovereigns waited for him to finish.

"I'm sorry," said Azulongmon. And what hurt most for Ryan was that he did sound truly sorry. "But we cannot interfere. In the matters of authors we take no stand. For the good of the FanFic Domain, it has been decreed that you solve things on your own."

_And never mind what happens to those of us who get caught in the crossfire,_ thought Ryan. _Or that you're basically standing aside to watch the house burn down with everyone else trapped inside._

Ryan sighed in frustration. "Is that your _final_ answer?" He asked.

As one, the four Sovereigns nodded.

Ryan made an attempt to run his hand through his hair, only to have it pass through himself. Ryan sighed again.

"Alright. Don't let me keep you from watching us, as always," Ryan tried not to let any contempt enter his voice, because despite everything they _did_ mean well, and he understood the reasons why they didn't want to involve themselves in author business. Back in the early days of the FanFic Domain's existence, when the Digimon Branch was just installed, the Sovereigns had involved themselves a lot in the Flaming Wars or even in individual story lines to protect against character bashing or even what they feared was character death (they hadn't understood at the time that it wasn't permanent). This interference caused much chaos and damage to the Domain website and nearly caused it to be shut down. All very understandable back then but _this_…

"Allow us to send you back directly," said Azulongmon. "It is the least that we can do for your valiant efforts."

Ryan paused, and nodded. Even though it was highly likely that he couldn't do anything, the faster he got back the better. He didn't want to miss a moment to be with his friends should everything go down the tubes.

The Four Sovereigns closed their eyes, and energy began to form and crackle around Ryan. Ryan felt his ghostly form tingle sharply, and then he felt a sudden rush of power as he was disassembled once again and shot towards his destination in one blinding flash of light. When the light faded, the Sovereigns looked at each other.

"It is almost over," said Baihumon.

"Yes," said Azulongmon.

"But will they have the strength to overcome what lies ahead?" Asked Ebonwumon.

None of the Sovereigns could, or would, give an answer to that question.

_Be safe children,_ thought Azulongmon. _Be strong._

_-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------_

CRASH!

Krodromon was crushed to the floor by Shadow Seraphimon's Seven Hells Attack. Gritting her teeth from within her digital sphere, Kaio got back to her feet. She saw the other's moving in to try and back her up, but she quickly told them to try and get to the computer. As much as the move to help her and Arbomon was appreciated, they couldn't afford the computer being destroyed in an all out battle between multiple, and large, bodies so it was looking like it was going to be one on one this time around.

Of course, being that they were confined in a fairly small room (well, small to _her _standards) this was proving to be even more difficult than it should be, and she was the one who had type advantage.

_Can't help but feel that I'm shooting to miss here,_ Kaio thought sarcastically as she used Krodromon's Dragonis Rage Attack, her claws burning with blue fire as she slashed at the Mega digimon. Shadow Seraphimon caught the attack easily with his hands, not flinching at all from the heat before hitting Krodromon with his Shadow Starburst Attack. Kaio gritted her teeth against the pain of the electrical attack._ Stupid,_ she cursed at herself. She had forgotten that Patamon's higher-level forms tended to be stronger than the average digimon on the same level, and in all likelihood he was being backed by a bit of the Lord of Fantasy's account power. At best, she could hold off the Mega until her friends could actually do what they had set out to accomplish. Straining against the pain, Krodromon opened her jaws.

"COSMIC FLAME!" She shouted and fired several blue tinged fireballs, point blank at her assailant. They burned with the light of a dying star before going off, sending Shadow Seraphimon flying backwards. Just as he was recovering himself in mid-air, Krodromon was on him, claws flaming blue and slashing downwards. Shadow Seraphimon countered with a focused Sonic Shockwave Attack that blew her back.

_This soooo sucks!_ Thought Kaio from within her sphere.

_My, aren't we cheerful? I mean we're only losing to an Angel here…_

_Can it, Arbomon! We've got to take this outside or something. Somewhere where there's more room to maneuver, otherwise we're just going to get pasted. And just for the record, I **never** said that we were losing! And aren't you supposed to be supporting me, here?_

_Sorry, couldn't resist._

_…_

_Just what I needed, a comedian for a partner. I think Rika once said something about getting Renamon a _Standup Comedian Upgrade_ card. I'm starting to think that I might need one for you too!_

_Uh… whatever. We've got a fight on our hands here…_

_Wha…? Oh, right!_

Krodromon brought her claws up to block another one of Shadow Seraphimon's Shadow Starburst Attacks before countering with Dragonis Rage.

_I just wish that those goofballs would hurry up!_

_-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------_

Chris winced at each blow that the two Mega's were landing on each other, each one getting just a little bit stronger than the last. It was when Krodromon fired off her Cosmic Flame Attack that Chris decided that something definitely needed to be done.

"Okay, um… I think that **now **would be an appropriate time to be doing something. What about you guys?"

"I'm with you," said Izzy. "Let's go."

"Not so fast," said TK. He was holding something in his hands. It almost looked like a tag that the Digi-destined used to wear from season one, only there was something in it. Something black.

_Somehow I don't think that I want to find out what's behind door number three, _thought Chris, but he stepped forward anyway.

"Back off TJ," said Caramon from Chris's shoulder. "Your partner's currently occupied and all lines are busy. Come back when things have died down a bit and try again later."

_Oh yeah, real smart Caramon,_ thought Chris._ Make him angry by using the old nicknames that Davis used to call him. He doesn't need any reminders of that, stupid!_

TK, interestingly enough, didn't get mad, or show any other signs of anger. Only contempt filled his voice as he held up the tag. "You assume that I'm not able to defend myself," he said. "But the Lord of Fantasy has provided for this eventuality. He gave me, the _Crest of Darkness_." As soon as he spoke that name, the tag burst into dark light, shooting outwards and crashing into the children and digimon, knocking them to the ground. Grimacing, Chris and the others got back to their feet.

"Okay," said Chris. "You get points for that. I wasn't expecting the Lord of Fantasy to toss in something that he made up. I thought he stuck within the lines of canon material…"

"Keep your points!" Snarled TK. "Just die!" The crest began to glow again, and an eerie red aura began to surround it. "You never did know how to fully utilize the power of the crests," he gloated.

_Here it comes…_thought Chris.

"NO!" Shouted Kari, as she stepped forward. TK actually looked surprised.

"Kari," he said calmly. "Are you volunteering to be my first victim?"

Kari's eyes narrowed. "No. I'm here to see if the Lord of Fantasy's darkness is any match for my light."

TK's eyes widened. "A test of wills then? What makes you think that you have what it takes?"

Kari smiled. "I have _hope_. Hope that I can reach the real you, buried beneath all that rewriting. Light and Hope is all I need."

"Hope dies though," said TK as a dark aura began to engulf him. "And without it, the Light fails. I know that better than anyone."

"We shall see," said Kari as she began to glow.

Energy shot out from their bodies, colliding into each other, striving for dominance, but at the moment neither one of them gaining an edge.

The others turned away so that they would not be blinded by the lights sheer intensity, or be drawn into the deep depths of the darkness, their attention turning to Krodromon's battle with Shadow Seraphimon.

It didn't seem to be going well. The two were locked in battle still, practically deadlocked.

"All right," said Chris in frustration. "That tears it! I don't care what she says, she needs help! Caramon?"

Before the digimon could respond, another bright light erupted from the ceiling above them, and flew directly into the path of the battle between Kari and TK, intertwining with their energies. At Chris's side, Ryan's battered digivice sprang to life and a light emitted from it that shone like the heavens. Taking it off his belt, Chris looked at it, and his mouth gaped in surprise. As he watched, the digivice disintegrated before his very eyes. A voice spoke from it that was cold and without emotion.

**BYPASS DIGIVICE LOCK!**

**ACTIVATING WARP DIGIVOLUTION MATRIX!**

As the last fragments of Ryan's digivice floated away, Richoemon began to glow with a light of his own, and involuntarily words emerged from his lips.

"RICHOEMON! WARP DIGIVOLVE TOOO…"

"PALADRAMON!"

As everyone watched, Richoemon's body grew to almost the size of a Greymon, assuming a dragon/man like build as gray and black armor formed over his body. Clawed gauntlets appeared over his hands as well as shoulder guards. A Chrome Digizoid helm materialized over his face and a steel horn erupted from his snout. Great leathery wings sprouted from his back, finishing the transformation. The new Mega digimon stepped forward and growled. Raising his gauntlets, thin mechanisms rose up, and violet colored, crescent shaped energy blades flared to life. With a roar, the armored dragon digimon leapt forward, blades drawn back for a slashing maneuver. He bared his teeth and pronounced the words that would activate his special attack.

"DRAGON EDGE!"

A/N: I wrote this chapter while listening to the tune "Pain" by Three Days Grace, which I felt fit this chapter pretty well. Anyway, hope you enjoyed this latest installment. 'Till next time then. With best wishes to you all:

-Crazyeight

6


	33. Chapter 33

Disclaimer: Only a higher power can claim credit for Digimon and not expect any trouble from it. The rest of us just get sued.

The Wages of Fans is Fiction: Chapter 33

Data floated in the air before being pulled into the form of one Beelzemon, victorious over his opponent and counterpart. And which one was this? Demon Lord or Tamers?

_You said dat I wasn't fit to bear da title of 'Demon Lord',_ he thought as images of two young children, brother and sister came to mind. _Dat's perfectly fine by me. Never wanted it anyway._

C'mone, as if there was any doubt who would emerge on top, right?

As Beelzemon opened his eyes he looked up at the Domain Tower just in time to see something get blasted out of it. Whatever it was, it looked like it was going out for a date with a little something called gravity and was heading for a breakup. Black feathered wings ripped out of his back and a long gun formed around his right arm and he lifted himself into the air, flying on a direct course towards gravities latest victim. As he approached, he could see that it was a digimon, a pretty big one too. Well, he wouldn't let that stop him. Size wasn't everything after all.

"Go limp!" He shouted. "I got ya!"

"Wha…?" Began the digimon.

With a heavy crash the two digimon smacked into each other, both grunting from the force of the impact, but Beelzemon refused to give up and got ready to try and slow their descent to the ground. His efforts were unnecessary though, as the digimon flung him away with a snarl and assumed a hovering position in mid air. Beelzemon looked at the digimon, now able to identify it as Black Wargreymon.

"You know, dat's not da way that you thank your rescuer."

"I didn't need your help," Black Wargreymon spat.

"I'm willing to debate dat," replied Beelzemon. "But unfortunately I've got other business to attend to."

"As do I," growled Black Wargreymon.

No sooner than those words had left their mouths that a sudden light and the sound of stone being shattered caught their attention. Taking a look, Beelzemon's mouth opened in shock as a massive insectoid digimon erupted from out of the ground. Its dark colored carapace shone in the moonlight like something out of a nightmare, and its eyes shone with a crimson light. A snarl was emitted from within its throat, a deep guttural noise like some savage animal. As it lifted itself from out of the crater that its arrival had made, bits of earth falling to the ground, it let out a roar that echoed throughout the land. But no matter the noise, a shout could be heard over it; A shout that was in defiance of all that existed, and stood as a challenge to even heaven itself.

"Enter… D-LETER!"

Beelzemon was speechless. This thing was large, easily as big as the Mother D-Reaper from season three if not bigger. It looked like it could swallow every digimon on earth and the digital world and still have room to devour other TV series, starting with Gundam Wing as an appetizer. Next to him, Black Wargreymon snarled and flew towards the abomination.

"HEY!" Shouted Beelzemon and chased after the dark Mega. "WHAT THE HECK ARE YOU DOING?!" Okay, it was kind of obvious; he was going in for the attack, but it was a stupid thing to do if you had no idea what it was you were up against. It looked like Beelzemon was going to have to save his hide, _again_.

_Not dat he **needs** saving,_ thought Beelzemon dryly.  
"LORD OF FANTASY!" Shouted Black Wargreymon. "PREPARE TO FACE MY WRATH!"

At the sound of his voice, the monstrous form that the Lord of Fantasy had identified as D-Leter turned its head towards him and opened its jaws, a great white light held within it before lashing out in a beam of pure white light.

"BACK SPACE!" Shouted D-Leter as the beam roared towards Black Wargreymon, who showed no sign of changing course.

_Oh, you stupid son of a…_ thought Beelzemon as he flew above the viral Mega and kicked him in the small of his back, knocking him out of the path of the beam. Unfortunately for Beelzemon, he was still in the path of the beam and it smashed into him with all the strength of a Sovereign. Beelzemon screamed as he hurtled to the earth and crashed heavily into it, leaving a good-sized crater in the ground. Miraculously he was still alive, but he was in no condition to get back up to fight back. At least, not yet. He just… needed a few minutes, that was all.

_One of these days, I'm going to hafta stop thinking like a self-sacrificing hero. The pay isn't good and it tends to hurt a lot. Ugh… right after I kick this guys butt to the curb. _Beelzemon chuckled lightly as he felt unconsciousness claim him. That was what he said the last time this sort of thing had happened.

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Black Wargreymon was livid! How dare that digimon interrupt his vengeance! Granted, he had saved him from certain destruction, but it was more the principle of the thing. He had been closing in on his target, and he had been kicked out of following through with it. Oh, when this was over, he was so going to teach the Tamer Demon Lord a lesson! For now though, this new threat awaited. Gathering dark energy around him and centering it between his gauntlets, Black Wargreymon hurled his attack at the creature, hoping that it would, if nothing else upset its balance and topple the author from its back so that he could get at him more easily.

He would have his revenge. No matter what.

"TERRA DESTROYER!"

The attack hit home with a massive explosion, and was soon followed up by more attacks from some of the other digimon in the area, but it appeared that none of them were having any affect. Snarling, Black Wargreymon brought his gauntlets together above his head and began spinning rapidly, launching himself into the air and heading onto a collision course with the creature.

"BLACK TORNADO!" He shouted.

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Dean had felt a moment of panic when he saw D-Leter's attack hit Beelzemon, but was relief quickly filled him when he saw that the Mega wasn't automatically destroyed, as he had feared. It meant that the protection that had been bestowed upon his allies right before they had arrived here to throw down with the Lord of Fantasy had held. For the time being though. Dean had no idea just how long it would last against something like D-Leter, which, judging from the information he was getting off of it with his account senses, had the ability to delete anything that its attack came in contact with. Against that kind of power, nothing could hope to withstand for very long. Their only shot at survival was to mass one powerful attack and hope that it would do the trick. Gathering the digimon still conscious, which basically consisted of Sabremon, Rapidmon, Garudamon, MegaGargomon (despite having no ammunition), Imperialdramon, and a just now recovering Susanoomon he quickly told them to fire everything they had on yon D-Leter. Glowing with the power of stars, the Digimon channeled their energies and hurled them at the monster, hitting it dead on with all their might, triggering a large explosion that nearly knocked them down. When the fireworks died, Dean strained to see through the curtain of smoke that had been kicked up. Crimson eyes flickered to life, and a white bar of energy shot out of the smoke.

"DELETE KEY!"

Using his author abilities, Dean threw up a shield against the attack just as it hit them, and this time, despite having a shield protecting them, they all went down.

MegaGargomon sat up with a groan.

"This is embarrassing," he said in the voice of Terriermon. "We're getting the crap beat out of us by… what? A digimon who's attack is a button on a keyboard?"

"Terriermon…"

Dean got to his feet with a groan. _This isn't good,_ he thought. _From just that one shot alone I can tell that we have no way of beating this guy. We're too worn out from just fighting the Demon Lords, and even if we were at full strength we'd still have trouble._ Dean caught a glimpse of Black Wargreymon trying to drill into D-Leter's armored form, but to no avail apparently. Because no sooner than he had made contact with its body a white light blasted him and the Mega digimon joined his companions on the ground with an earthshaking crash. Staggering forward, Dean began to gather energy around him and began flinging it at D-Leter. Gritting his teeth, he put everything he had into each blast, his body screaming at him with each successive blast. He felt terrible, but there was no way that he was going to give up on this one! Everyone was counting on him, and he refused to let them down.

With one last burst of energy Dean collapsed to the ground, breathing heavily as sweat trickled down his face. His vision blurred a bit, but they soon snapped into focus just as the smoke and dust cleared once more, leaving an unscratched D-Leter standing. A low, ominous chuckle escaped its hideous mouth as it powered up another attack.

_No,_ thought Dean as he staggered back to his feet, fighting to draw on whatever energy reserves that he had left for one last attack. Summoning a sphere of energy similar to Wargreymon's Terra Force attack, he hurled it at his opponent just as D-Leter launched its own attack.

"BACK SPACE!"

The white blast of power tore through Dean's attack and slammed into the ground where he stood, kicking up dust and debris before they burst into shards of deleted data. As the attack ended, a huge crater could be seen, and in it lay the author Dean. He did not move.

"RAAARGH!" Shouted Sabremon as he flew on his wings of light towards D-Leter, his Omni Sword glowing fiercely in his rage. He was quickly joined by the other digimon, and D-Leter commenced to use them for target practice, knocking them down one by one with his Back Space Attack before finally ending it off with Sabremon. The attack struck home on Sabremon just as he brought his sword up to block the oncoming blast, and he struggled with it. Met it with every inch of his will power as lightning crackled around him. Slowly though, the energies that Sabremon had been holding back, leaked past his defenses, burning and melting his armor, charring his wings until finally, like a dam that had broken, D-Leter's Back Space Attack burst past his sword, slamming into him at full power and driving him to the earth, digging a trench as he impacted the ground like a meteorite. After the attack died, Sabremon climbed out of his hole, breathing heavily while a ways off, the Digi-destined watched in stunned amazement.

It seemed like this guy was about to redefine the ideology of _going down fighting_.

However, their amazement was quickly shattered as a light emitted from Sabremon, and the Omni Sword fell to the ground with a clatter. The light died down, leaving in Sabremon's place only the Tamer Reno and his digimon partner Dagmon, both looking exhausted. A second later, Dagmon collapsed, but Reno refused to go down. Taking one, shaky step forward Reno pressed a button on his D-Comp, and it began to glow slightly. He put his hands out in front of him as data began to emerge from it, forming a fireball. And it grew.

_We're not done yet,_ Shouted Reno in his mind, far too exhausted to give voice to how he was feeling. _We'll take you down! You hear me? We'll take… you… **DOWN!!!**_

"RAAARGH!!! DATA RELEASE! CHAOS FLARE!"

Pouring every fiber of his being into powering the attack, Reno flung the raging inferno that he was barely containing at D-Leter. As he watched the fireball travel its course towards the monster, he felt his legs give out from underneath him and his vision began to dim. His last vision of the world as his body collapsed to the ground was D-Leter laughing as the flames enveloped its form.

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The Lord of Fantasy laughed alongside his creation. He hadn't expected the boy to be able to use a high level digimon's attack without being merged with his partner. Not that it did anything of course, but it was a worthy effort. Certainly deserved an A with several hundred pluses next to it, but ultimately all that mattered was that it had failed. He turned his attention from the defeated warriors over to the Digi-Destined who, being human, had been unable to join the fight. Movement caught his eye. _Black Wargreymon again,_ he thought. _Will he never learn? _With a flick of his wrist, he blasted the lights darkest warrior out of the sky and laughed once again, as if at the ultimate joke. Suddenly, space tore above him and a strange digimon crashed into D-Leter, and the Lord of Fantasy was flung from off his perch. As he crashed to the ground he got a look at his creations assailant.

_Milleniummon,_ he thought. _Well, well, well. I didn't think Ryo would have what it takes to release you, after all the grief that you give him. No matter, let's see just how strong your metal is when tested against my greatest creation._

Deepening his focus, the Lord of Fantasy poured his power into D-Leter, and the creature opened its jaws, blasting Milleniummon point blank with one of its strongest attacks.

"DELETE KEY!"

There was a roar of pain and the mighty God like digimon known as Milleniummon fell back, his data destabilizing, but he was not yet out. Unfortunately, the Lord of Fantasy knew this, and with one more pouring of power into his creation, D-Leter reared back and let him have it.

"DELETE KEY!"

There followed once more, a massive explosion and Milleniummon's data pattern shattered and floated away into the starry sky, leaving behind a regressed Monodromon.

"No way…" said a voice from near where the Lord of Fantasy stood. Turning he saw Ryo and the Tamers, alongside some of the other Digi-destined and the Savers crew, staring dumb-founded at what had just transpired. The Lord of Fantasy smiled.

Nothing eroded a teams confidence like seeing something powerful just get defeated.

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"DRAGON EDGE!"

The shout of an attack being announced reached Krodromon's ears, and taking advantage of it she allowed Shadow Seraphimon to actually force her down so as to present a better target for whoever was coming to lend a helping hand. At least, she hoped that he or she was coming to help. Kaio was just going on instincts now. Shadow Seraphimon had just forced Krodromon on her back when he looked up…

Too late! A twin pair of violet colored, crescent shaped energy blades slashed into his body, sending him careening through a wall with his new enemy with him. Getting up, Krodromon breathed a sigh of relief before taking in the situation. There was a huge lightshow going on behind her, the others looked a little stunned over something (possibly from the sudden arrival of the new digimon), and Richoemon seemed to be missing. Looking back towards the hole in the wall, Krodromon scowled knowing who the new digimon was now but not knowing how it had happened. It wasn't important right now, because all of a sudden Kaio was feeling just a little bit irritated with her savior

"HEY!" Krodromon shouted in Kaio's voice. "BE MORE CAREFUL WHEN YOU DO STUFF LIKE THAT! YOU COULD HAVE DAMAGED THE COMPUTER!"

The new digimon, looked up from where he had pinned Shadow Seraphimon, obviously baffled by the lack of thanks from his comrade in arms.

"Huh?" He asked, only to be hit a second later by Shadow Seraphimon as he used the distraction to fire a Seven Hells Attack at Paladramon, knocking him off.

_Whoops, _said Kaio from within her data sphere.

_Real smooth, Kaio,_ said Arbomon.

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Kari struggled against the overwhelming tides of shadow and darkness as they threatened to consume her soul. It strove her to push harder, to resist more, but it seemed as though the harder she fought the stronger the darkness became. She was starting to lose hope, an almost ironic thing since she was fighting against the boy who was supposed to be its bearer. The light that had once surrounded her began to ebb as the darkness swallowed it and began to surround her. Soon she would be completely enveloped by it, and it seemed as though there was nothing she could do to stop it. Kari closed her eyes in frustration.

Not since her first experience with the Dark Ocean had she felt so helpless.

_I don't think that I can win this. I'm so sorry everyone. Tai, TK, Davis, Gatomon, everyone… but I'm losing and there's no one who can help me. I'm not strong enough on my own…_

"_Isn't that what friends are for, Kari?" Asked a voice from out of the darkness. "Or did you forget that lesson of life too when your memories were changed?"_

_Kari opened her eyes, and found herself in a wholly different place from where she had been, and with her laying a comforting hand on her shoulder stood a boy with shaggy brown hair and forest green eyes. A small, understanding, and friendly smile graced his features. For a second, the Digi-destined of Light had trouble placing the face with the name, but only for a second._

"_Ryan!" She cried out. The boy nodded._

"_In the flesh… sort of. Just me doing my best impression of the Ghost of Christmas Past. Or Present. Or Future. Meh, take your pick."_

"_What are you doing here?"_

"_Well, that's a tricky question. I met the Sovereigns and they gave me a lift back, but it looks like they're coordinates coincided with… whatever's going on here. I take it that there's a reason as to why you're fighting TK?"_

_Kari nodded. "The Lord of Fantasy has done something to his memories to make him hate us. I'm trying to bring him back." Kari thought for a second and fixed Ryan with a questioning look. "Are the Sovereigns here?"_

"… _Let's skip that for a bit. What's important now is what's going on here, the battle that you're fighting. You're taking on the darkness head to head, and you're losing."_

_Kari looked down shamefully. "I'm… I'm not strong enough to fight the darkness."_

_Ryan looked at her and cocked an eyebrow. "C'mone Kari. You don't mean that. I mean, you've gone toe to toe with some pretty nasty stuff in the past, everything from Myotismon to MaloMyotismon. Why is this any different?"_

_Kari was silent for a second. "Because…" she began. "It's TK. TK and the darkness. I can't fight TK. I could never fight him."_

"_And yet, here you are. You looked pretty determined earlier to go to Hades in order to bring him back. So why? What's the problem?"_

_Kari gave no answer. Ryan sighed._

"_Darkness is a tricky thing," he said. "It has a way of swallowing you whole if you're not careful. Nine times out of ten, it will devour whoever messes around with it as though it were some toy. That's why there are so few dark warriors who fight for the side of light, but they are out there. Their line of work just happens to be much harder, more dangerous because the line that they walk is like a razor's edge. One wrong move and you can hurt yourself pretty bad, but there's no denying that the power that those kinds of warriors have is undeniable."_

"_What are you saying?" Asked Kari._

"_Well, I'm just saying that you may have to take a risk, for TK. If you really want to save him, you may have to stop fighting the darkness and enter its own domain to find him. Very dangerous for you, not just because you're the bearer of light, but also because you'll have to face your own hidden demons, and when it comes to darkness, no one knows your greatest fears better than it does. And that's because it doesn't deny that those fears exist, but it will… amplify them. That's darkness for you. Go figure."_

"_Stop fighting the darkness?" Asked Kari. "But, that's… I can't do that. I'm supposed to fight against it. It's what I was destined to do."_

"_Kari, you the other's were chosen to keep the darkness from spreading and upsetting the balance of the Digital World. Not even TK could say that he could truly hate the darkness; because wherever there is light you get the shadows that it casts. That's a part of nature. It's what makes life, life. It's not always pretty; not always sun and roses, but the good has to come with the bad. I don't pretend to understand why things were made that way unless it was to teach us some kind of lesson, but that's how things are. Do you understand what I'm getting at, Kari?"_

"_I… think so."_

"_Good, because my brain is hurting from all this philosophical talk."_

"_So what now?"_

"_That depends on just how much you care about TK, and how badly you want to reach him. After that you have to throw out the instruction manual. I can't help you much further than this. I'm just a dead guy living on borrowed time here. What you do is your decision, though from where I'm standing, I can't see where you have much of a choice."_

_With renewed determination Kari made her decision._

_-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------_

As the others watched, the darkness that TK was pouring at Kari overwhelmed her light, and washed over the girl. A small glow still blazed within it though, but nothing more. Shadow Seraphimon still battled it out with Paladramon and Krodromon, but at the moment it seemed that the fallen angel had the upper hand. Bringing his hands together he powered up his Shadow Blast Attack and blew the two Mega's away from him. Turning towards the battle, Gaomon growled.

"All right, I'm through standing on the sidelines! I'm goin' in there!"

"Wha…?" Sputtered William. "Are you nuts? You'll get creamed out there!"

Gaomon either didn't care or wasn't listening, because he immediately took off towards the fight just as soon as Shadow Seraphimon charged up another Shadow Blast Attack, aiming it at the two temporarily disabled Megas.

"Jeez," said Chris. "Looks to me like he takes after you."

Will shouted Gaomon's name one more time as the little rookie placed himself in the path of Shadow Seraphimon's line of fire. As Will looked on, a glow surrounded Shadow Seraphimon as the Shadow Blast left his hands.

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_Kari struggled against the shadows as they surrounded her, taunted her, showed her things that she desired, that she feared. Ignoring them and what they implied the Child of Light strode forward, practically leaning forward as though fighting against a fierce wind. She was no longer battling against the darkness as though it were some enemy that needed to be destroyed, because that would have wasted her energies. Kari glowed with light as she walked forward, illuminating the darkness and showing it up for the scared weak thing that it was, but she did not focus on any specific part of it. She just kept the light on to keep the darkness away from her as she reached her destination. As she moved forward, a figure began to become visible, in outline only but it was a start. The shadows pushed against her all the harder, again hitting her with images that both frightened her and called to her at the same time, but she shrugged them aside. She reached towards the figure, and the shadows screamed at her._

"_NO! MINE! MINE! MINE! LEAVE HIM WEAKLING! Cowardly child of the Light! Leave him…"_

"_Shut up," said Kari as she again reached out. As she did so she could almost swear that she felt something, or someone reaching with her, as if lending her strength._

"_Go to it," whispered a voice softly, and she did. Her hands grasped hold of the figure by the sides of its head and it stiffened in surprise. Before it could escape her grasp, Kari pulled it forward and her trembling lips found its own. _

_-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------_

The darkness and light faded into nothing, revealing the battered form of Kari embraced in a kiss with the blonde haired boy named TK, who returned the kiss with passion, all the darkness lifted from his heart. His right hand opened and the Crest of Darkness fell to the floor with a clatter.

Next to them, Ryan, a physical Ryan, dropped to the floor in exhaustion.

Kari and TK broke apart, and looked into each other's eyes. There was so much to say, so much that needed to be healed between them, but that would wait until later. Whenever that would be. For now, they were content with staying like this, wrapped in each other's arms, and in the sense of safety that they both now felt in each other's presence.

Reality intruded suddenly as William's shout reached their ears. Turning, the two chosen children saw that Shadow Seraphimon had just slide evolved to Seraphimon, but was too late to stop the Shadow Blast that he had sent earlier. In the line of fire stood the little blue dog like rookie known as Gaomon, fully intent on protecting his friends from the Mega level attack.

"GAOMON! NO!" Shouted William.

A/N: Whew! That was one of the longest chapters I have ever written for this story. Gotta rest now, but expect more soon as we come to the last one or two chapters of this fic. So stay tuned!

9


	34. Chapter 34

Disclaimer: Digimon is a trademarked product that I do not own.

The Wages of Fans is Fiction: Chapter 34

The first thing he heard was the sound of typing, followed by a voice.

_"I think he's coming around."_

More voices followed. Lots of them, overlapping each other, and they were familiar too. There was also darkness…

_Open your eyes, idiot._

Duh.

With a groan, his eyelids slid open, and then snapped shut again as his sight was assaulted by light, followed by the sharp pain that tore through his skull like a lightning bolt, giving him an early idea as to what a hangover must feel like.

_Pain?_

For some odd reason, it almost felt like a concept that he had been without for a while. Weird.

Slowly, Ryan opened his eyes again and found himself staring into a number of concerned faces, some he recognized immediately, and others that he felt that he should recognize but for some reason couldn't place the name with the face. _That's not a good sign…_

The people gathered around him breathed a sigh of relief.

"See Kaio?" Said one red haired boy to a dark haired girl with what looked like a cat like digimon dangling off her shoulder. "Told you so. And you didn't believe me."

"All right, Will," came the irritated reply from the girl who William had identified as Kaio. "You were right. No need to gloat about it. Jeez."

"Awww…"

Ryan sat up with a groan. One of the other kids, Chris his name was, tried to hold him down.

"Take it easy dude," he said. "You just came back from the great beyond, though how you managed that is going to be a story that we'd _all_ like to hear someday."

Ryan didn't really hear that last part. He looked around the room, taking it in foot by square foot.

"Where am I?" He asked, confused. "And what's going on? The last thing I remember was Black Wargreymon throwing a red ball at Reno and…" he paused and frowned, as though he had just stumbled across a confusing puzzle. "Something else about Rika's hair being down, but that can't be right. I'd have to be dead for that."

William looked at the boy funny. "You feeling okay, man? I mean, last I checked you were dead, and the next thing I know you're lying here, alive, after going for a swim in a battle between the crests of light and darkness."

Ryan stared at his friend for a second with a blank look. Then a few memories floated into his mind. "Awww… crud." Chris smiled.

"He'll be okay."

"You sure?" Asked TK from next to Kari.

"Oh, yeah. He just died and got reformatted. You can hardly expect his brains to not be a bit scrambled from the process, but he should be fine after a bit. No biggie. I think."

"That last part's not very comforting," said Kaio.

Chris just shrugged.

Ryan took another look around the room, and found Izzy busily typing away on his laptop, which was connected to another computer, obviously the main computer to the Domain Tower. Standing next to him like some kind of Praetorian Guard was Seraphimon and…

Ryan blinked and turned to Will.

"You mind telling me just how _that_ happened?"

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_"GAOMON! NO!" Shouted William as he stood helplessly watching Shadow Seraphimon's Shadow Blast Attack finish its journey towards his partner, smashing into him with a fiery explosion. Behind where the rookie had stood, Paladramon and Krodromon were desperately trying to get to their feet, knowing full well that no matter how fast they moved they were already too late. There was a shining burst of light being emitted by Will's digivice, but due to the intensity of the explosion no one noticed. _

_No one dared to move. Not even Will, too shocked by what he had just witnessed. His mind was screaming all sorts of negatives against it, as though it were enough to change what had happened._

_And oddly enough, it worked._

_The cloud that had been kicked up was swept away by a gust of wind, and from it emerged a blue armored wolf like digimon, bearing claw like gauntlets similar to Wargreymon's and a red cape billowed behind him. Chris pulled out his digivice to analyze the new digimon while William's face broke into the widest grin he had ever worn in his life._

MIRAGE GAOGAMON

_STAGE: Mega_

_TYPE: Data_

_SPECIAL ATTACKS: Full Moon Blaster, Double Crescent Mirage, Gale Claw_

_Chris looked up at the new Mega._

_"Huh," he said. "Guess every dog does have their day, after all."_

_"ALL RIIIIIIGHT!" Shouted Will._

_-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------_

"So… how come he got to digivolve?" Asked Ryan. "I thought that our author put a lock on our digivices."

"Richoemon digivolved to Mega," replied William.

"Yeah, but his digivice was destroyed in the process," said Chris.

"Okay, yeah, that's a good point…"

"It's elementary," said Izzy from where he stood, still typing away. "Gaomon's a canon character from the Digimon series. His evolution line doesn't really have to be guessed at when all anyone has to do is go online to look it up."

Chris looked over at Will with an exasperated look on his face. "You know, that bit of knowledge probably could have helped us a few times in the past. _Quite_ a few times."

Will sweat dropped. "Hey, take it easy man. It's not my fault that I didn't read the fine print in my contract…"

"Done," said Izzy. The other's turned to him.

"Done?" Asked Ryan. "Done with what?"

"Done with the program that Dean gave him before we got here," said Kaio with a sigh. "When it's activated it should kick the Lord of Fantasy off his account, or at least cut him off from the powers that it grants him, giving us the edge when we go head to head with him."

"Oh."

"All right," said Izzy as his right hand drifted over the Enter key. "Here we go."

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"SPIRIT STRIKE!"

"SPIRAL BONE CRUSHER!"

"GALE CLAW!"

"GLORIOUS BURST!"

"BEAUTY SHOCK!"

"DELETE KEY!"

With one shot, D-Leter's attack cut through the other oncoming attacks like a hot knife through melting butter before impacting with the offending digimon with a tremendous explosion. As the dust settled they were down, and had reverted back to their rookie forms.

Except for one.

"SKULLMAMMOTHMON MODE CHANGE TOOO…"

"SKULLMAMMOTHMON! GUARDIAN MODE!"

John grinned from within his data sphere before charging forward, crashing head on with the monster, his tusks, now looking like vicious scimitars, keeping D-Leter's mouth away from him, and for the moment keeping him safe. He had survived the initial blast by mode changing, but if he was any judge of power (and he was one) he wasn't too sure if he could take another hit.

Anything that could take out Milleniummon deserved that kind of consideration.

"SENTINAL'S OATH!" Cried SkullMammothmon, as the gold bands on his wrists glowed with a golden fire akin to sun before he brought them down on D-Leter's skull. He continued to smash away at D-Leter, knowing that if he let up for even a second D-Leter would be able to formulate a counter attack, and then it would all be over.

The Lord of Fantasy frowned as he watched the new form of SkullMammothmon begin pounding on his creation without letup. _That twit,_ he thought as he formed a ball of energy in his hands and prepared to hurl it at the Mega digimon. He didn't notice Ryo Akiyama running towards him. With Monodromon out of the fight, he had ignored the legendary Tamer. He hadn't even considered him a threat.

Big mistake.

The Lord of Fantasy fell to the ground when he felt a foot connect with the small of his back, and his sphere went wild as he lost control of his energies. There was a scream of pain and Ryo fell to the ground, his body shaking from the sudden overload that his nervous system had just received. The Lord of Fantasy spat on the ground and crawled over to him, grabbing Ryo by the shirt as electricity began to dance along his arms, making their way towards his hands.

"This is where it all ends, Ryo Akiyama…"

Suddenly there was a sharp piercing sound being emitted from the tower that sounded like a whistle, followed by the hum of a harmonica being played. Their sound carried on the wind, like the ghosts of old memories and lost innocence. The Lord of Fantasy wanted to cry with sadness; he wanted to laugh with joy. Memories washed over him, over everyone gathered in that land beneath the stars and moon before finally fading with a soft echo. Gone as though they had never been. The Lord of Fantasy frowned, wondering what had just transpired from within the Tower, but not really having the time to investigate. He turned back to Ryo, smirking.

"Now, where was I…?" He concentrated and sent the command to kill.

Nothing happened. The Lord of Fantasy blinked in surprise.

Taking advantage of the sudden shift in events, Ryo cracked the Lord of Fantasy across the jaw, sending him sprawling to the ground. Groaning, Ryo stood up.

"Always figured that you had a glass jaw," he said with that same confident smile that he almost always wore. Ah man, no matter how horrible he was feeling right now he could say one thing; nothing dulled pain like the feeling of having achieved victory over your enemy.

"I'm not finished yet," spat the Lord of Fantasy.

"Give it up," said Ryo. "Your beat. No one's here to help you now, and the characters all have their memories back. No one's going to want to work with you again. Not after what you've done to them."

"That's what you think now," said the Lord of Fantasy, smiling like a lunatic. "But I still have D-Leter."

As if to emphasize the point, a shout of _DELETE KEY_ was heard, and SkullMammothmon fell to the ground, his armor cracked and smoking. After a second, he parted into the forms of John and Tapirmon.

"YOU HAVE NOTHING AKIYAMA! NO MORE ALLIES TO CALL UPON! WHAT WILL YOU DO… wait! Wha…?"

Ryo followed the Lord of Fantasy's gaze to the night sky. Once again, a grin bloomed on his face and he looked back at the author.

"The sky is falling," he said sarcastically.

Indeed, the sky was falling. Or rather, the stars from the night sky were, and this time they did not land as though they were errant meteorites. They slowed gradually as they reached the earth, becoming doorways from which stepped strange forms. Some that were human, some that were not human. One of them stopped in front of the Lord of Fantasy, and from it emerged a humanoid female dragon with wings, claws, and a tail complete with shoulder-length brown hair and green-blue-gray eyes. She wore a loose-fitting black shirt; khaki pants with black boots, and had two fox ears sticking out of her head. Looking over at Ryo she smiled before turning to the Lord of Fantasy and gave him a scowl that he would remember all of his days.

"Lord of Fantasy," the humanoid dragon hissed. "You have caused quite a lot of grief for quite a lot of people. I and the assembled authors of the Digimon branch of the FanFic Domain have finally broken through your defenses and now call upon you to step forward and be judged. How do you plead?"

The Lord of Fantasy laughed. "Digital-Dragon-Master," he said. "I do not recognize your authority, though you stand in the highest of ranks amongst our peers. Only _I_ know the true story, and will tell it as it was meant to be told."

Digital-Dragon-Master looked over at Ryo. "Kind of full of himself isn't he?" Ryo chuckled lightly and nodded. She looked back at the Lord of Fantasy. "Surrender, oh former Lord. We'll go easier on you if you do."

"Don't be naïve!" He shouted. "You cannot take me! _None_ of you can! Not while I hold the Tower…"

"Your hold over the tower is broken," Digital-Dragon-Master stated plainly. "There are characters in there even now, and they have freed the Child of Hope from your grasp and locked you out of your account. You have no more cards to play."

The Lord of Fantasy's face clouded. "No," he said. "I still have one." Leaping into the air, he called out. "D-LETER!"

As though on some hidden signal, the body of the entity known as D-Leter began to power up and glow with a fearsome light. Digital-Dragon-Master told Ryo to get behind her and began to power up her own attack, as did thousands of other authors. As the Lord of Fantasy landed on the back of his creation, D-Leter called out his ultimate attack.

"SYSTEM WIPE!" A white sphere of energy encased itself around D-Leter and began to expand outwards, data shredding and tearing as it poured outwards.

Digital-Dragon-Master brought her hands together, preparing to add her strength to the other authors. "EARTH SPIRIT," She intoned. "AEGIS OF THE DRAGONS!"

Thousands of lights intermingled and struck the ever-growing sphere, halting its expansion and then gradually reducing it down to a single point. It struggled against the combined powers of the authors before finally winking out of existence, leaving only a crater.

Of D-Leter and the Lord of Fantasy, there was no sign except for the shards of data that drifted towards the night sky.

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A/N: Okay, THIS time I'm pretty sure that I have only two chapters left. One dealing directly with this story, and the last involving some final thoughts on my experience with this story and everyone who's been involved with it. The last chapter may also include a little something special for all you readers out there, so stay tuned!

-Crazyeight

6


	35. Chapter 35

Disclaimer: I don't own Digimon. For thirty-five chapters I have stated this; I don't think that I can state this enough. And just so we're clear, I don't own the song, _Burning Bridges_ by the Mike Curb Congregation either. So there.

The Wages of Fans is Fiction: Chapter 35

John's vision of the world was a bit blurry when he opened his eyes, but that changed quickly. His head was lying on something soft, and above him were the faces of Joe Kido, Renamon, and Rika Nonaka. They seemed to be discussing something while Joe, the good doctor that he is, tended to his injuries. Rika looked at John and smiled lightly.

"Well, look who's awake. About time doofus, Renamon was worried about you."

Before John could make a reply to that, a pair of paws wrapped themselves around the Avatar's head. Looking up into Renamon's blue eyes John gasped. She… she looked tense about something! But why…? Before he could even ask, the vulpine digimon lowered her head and pulled the boy into a deep and passionate kiss that completely and totally caught him off guard! His eyes widened to the size of golf balls as his body almost froze in surprise and he was about to protest, but his mind quickly recovered from the shock and he decided that it was best to choose the path of least resistance. Judging by Renamon's actions and the look on Rika's face when he had woken up he guessed that they must have won after all, so he felt that he more than deserved to celebrate a little.

"Uh... Renamon?" Asked Joe. "I don't think that it's a good idea to get him all excit…" the doctor in training stopped as he took a look at Rika, who was giving him a look that told him that under no circumstances was he to interrupt their special moment together. Joe sighed. "Never mind." Joe sat back and waited for the two to break it up so that he could continue with his diagnosis. Little did he know that he was going to be waiting for a very long time.

Rika smiled softly at the site of the two and decided to give them some privacy. Joe could stay since he still needed to complete his checkup on the kid, but she wasn't really necessary. Getting up she began to wander through the crowd of Chosen Children and Avatars as they went about their business, tending to the wounded and making plans to help with restoring the Domain's main server. Looking back at her partner the Digimon Queen felt her heart soar at the site.

_Looks like somebody's got a happy ending from this. Too bad not everyone is going to have one._

Looking around, she found Tai and Sora exchanging a hug, both of them with tears running down their faces. In the end the two parted, and Tai took off his engagement ring and gave it to his best friend Matt, who was standing nearby. They too, exchanged a hug of camaraderie, though it too was not without its tears, and a ways off stood the second season Goggle Head, Davis, standing with his partner Veemon next to him as he looked out at the Domain Tower, a great exclamation point in the rising of the new dawn.

_Not all endings are happy,_ Rika thought, remembering her own experience with her season and the original Digi-destined when they had to say good-bye to their partners. Rika wished that it wouldn't be so, but that was life after all. Imaginary or real, not everyone gets what they want. She was about to walk off when her eyes caught sight of the Domain Tower's doors opening. She saw something exiting the structure and her breath caught.

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Reno and Dagmon stood next to the author's Dean and Digital-Dragon-Master as they talked things out with Black Wargreymon. Most of what they had to say was a long lecture about rule infringement and betrayal, but it had been decided by a majority of the Authors that the viral Mega was to be forgiven and, as a reward for his part in the final battle against the Lord of Fantasy, he was to be given the duty of guarding the Domain Tower against future such transgressions. Black Wargreymon had been greatly surprised, and grateful, and he had accepted the posting modestly (he had protested at first, but it would seem that the authors, especially Dean, wouldn't take _no_ for an answer). Black Wargreymon swore to defend the Domain Tower with his life, and Digital-Dragon-Master accepted this without complaint. Black Wargreymon now had a new purpose in life, and his word had always been his bond, even if he could be a bit chaotic at times.

Dean turned to Reno and extended him a hand, which the Tamer eagerly shook.

"Well, Reno," he said. "It's been a pleasure working with you. We should do it again sometime."

Reno laughed. "Provided that there _is_ a next time, though to be honest I hope not. Getting smacked around by Demon Lords, crazy programs, and authors all in one sitting is pretty rough on a guy. But if you ever _do _need the help again…"

Dean nodded and smiled. "You'll be the first one I'll call. I'll be seeing you later." And with that, Dean marched off to join the throng of authors. Reno looked down at Dagmon.

"Well Dag," he said, stretching his arms and yawning. "I don't know about you, but I sure could use some rest. We still have a fic to finish up and I'm sure our author is chomping at the bit waiting to hear from us."

"I wouldn't doubt it," said Dagmon, chuckling wryly. "You know, this was pretty fun. Despite being beaten on by crazy authors and power mad digimon it felt pretty good to actually get out there and get my claws dirty."

"You said it," said Reno laughing. "Now come on, let's see what we can scrounge up for food around here. I have a feeling that we're going to be needing it for the long trek home."

"That's for sure."

Together, the two friends and partners walked off, joining the crowd as they began their newest and most important journey, the quest for a burger with a side order of fries. And something to drink to while they were at it. Saving an entire website from certain destruction sure was thirsty business…

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"C'mon, Chris," grunted William as he, Ryan, Chris, Kaio, and the others pushed against the doors of the Domain Tower. "Put your back into it! Don't tell me that you're already starting to feel old age coming onto you, 'cause you're only a freakin' twelve year old!"

"Oh, shut up," said Chris. "Technically you, me, and Ryan here are only about one or two months old with the appearance and intelligence of twelve year olds."

"You're only as old as you feel Chris," grunted Ryan as he strained against the door. "And from where I'm standing, I think Will's right. My grandmother could open this door faster than you and she's in her 80's!"

"I don't see you trying any harder than me, Ryan!"

"At least I have an excuse! I'm still in mourning here."

"What mourning? You came back to life didn't ya? That's no excuse for you to be lazy!"

"Would you both put a sock in it?" Demanded Kaio as sweat poured down her face. "You're starting to annoy me, so save your breath for pushing or I'll make sure that you won't use that breath for speaking _ever_ again."

"Well, tidings of comfort and joy to you too," said Ryan.

"Rrrrrrr-AAAAGH!" With one final push, the characters threw open the doors and stumbled out into the fresh open air. A small breeze played with their hair as they breathed it in, letting out a sigh of relief. Looking around they took note of the large number of authors and characters that were around the Domain Tower's vicinity. There didn't seem to be any fighting, no trouble. No anything. Everyone seemed to be happy, well, of a sort.

"I take it that we missed the rest of the show," said Kaio.

"Aw man, that stinks!" Said Will. "I was _so_ hoping to try out Achilles's Mega form against the Lord of Fantasy! Ah, well. Better luck next time…"

Gaomon sweat dropped. "Are you _ever_ going to call me by my real name?"

"What do you think Kim?"

"Rrrrgh… Will…"

A humanoid dragon with fox ears approached the group and stopped before them.

"The assembled authors of the Digimon Branch of the FanFic Domain would like to congratulate you all on a job well done, and would like to extend to you their thanks and appreciation for everything that you've done in the service of _freedom of the press and speech_."

"Does that mean that we get a medal?" Asked Gaomon with a hopeful look in his eyes.

"No, just a review. It's basically the same thing."

"Awww…"

Will patted Gaomon on the head. "Don't worry buddy. When we get home, I'm going to fix you a nice, juicy steak and let you watch the movie of your choice. And if you're really, really good, I may even call you by your real name."

"Gee, I feel honored."

The Avatar looked at the two strangely before turning to Kaio and Arbomon. "Are you ready to go home?"

Kaio nodded.

"Good. Now, would you mind telling me what the deal was with only leaving me a note that you were off to save the FanFic Domain with a strange author? Do you know how worried I was? The least you could have done was call or something! I mean, is that too much to ask for?"

"Sorry, _mother_," said Kaio sarcastically as she rolled her eyes.

"Don't you take that tone with me young lady, you're going to get it! Just because you helped save Digimon FanFiction doesn't mean that you can't be grounded…"

Ryan closed his eyes to the exchange and smiled wistfully as he breathed in the fresh air. Ah, it was good to be alive again! First thing he was going to do when he got home, he was…

"Uh, Ryan? You might want to look out," interrupted the voice of Chris from next to him. Ryan was about to open his eyes and turn to him to ask him just what the heck he was talking about when he suddenly felt a pair of arms enfold themselves around him and pull him into a hug. His eyes snapped open and he caught a glimpse of red hair.

"What the…?" He began, his mind completely and totally confused.

"Hey," said Rika as she held the boy tightly. "Welcome back to the land of the living."

"Um… thanks?" Ryan sweat dropped. _Okay, this is really, really weird._ Looking over at his friends he could tell that they were just as surprised as he was. None of them were used to Rika being in this close of a proximity to anyone unless it was to strangle them.

As if sensing his confusion, Rika shifted slightly. "What? Can't I be glad to see one of my friends come back from being dead?"

"We're friends?" Asked Ryan, knowing that it was absolutely the wrong thing to say, but unable to stop himself from saying it. He had expected Rika to be angry, to either punch him out or at least fix him with a glare, but surprisingly she didn't do any of those things. Instead she just held him tighter.

"Idiot," she whispered.

Next to them, Chris, Caramon, William, and Gaomon stared at the scene with confusion and shock etched onto their faces. Chris was the first to break out of it as a thought occurred to him. Grinning like a maniac he nudged William.

"Hey, if this was a romance fic, do you think it would count as a Ryuki?"

William's eyes became as golf balls as they bulged in his sockets. "Dude, don't ever let our author hear you say…"

Suddenly, a bolt of electricity leapt from Chris's digivice and shocked him in the rear, making him jump and howl more out of surprise then in pain.

"…That," finished William as he winced. "Whoops. Too late."

"OW!" Chris shouted as he pulled out his digivice. His screen lit up and displayed a message for him to read. Whatever it said, it obviously did not make him happy. "HE SHOCKED ME! The jerk shocked me through my digivice! Oh, when I see him again…"

A shadow fell on him, and Chris turned to look at the enraged face of one Rika Nonaka. Apparently she had heard his little _comment_.

"Uh… hi there, Rika…"

The girl cracked her knuckles. "You have a five second head start," the girl grated.

"Oh, c'mone! It was just a joke! Be reasonable…"

"One… two…

Chris looked at Ryan and William for help. Then at Kaio and Digital-Dragon-Master, and finally at the other assembled characters. They all shook their heads. Well, except for Ryan, he just looked up at the sky, trying not to be noticed.

"Four…"

"You're on your own, dude," said William as he tipped the blonde haired boy a salute.

"Oh, man. You guys suck." And with that, Chris took off with the hotheaded Tamer close on his heels.

Will looked over at Ryan, who was in the middle of controlling a fearsome blush. Will smiled.

"So," he began. "How's it feel to be back?"

"I'm starting to think that I was better off staying dead."

"Ah, you don't mean that!"

"Yes, I do. Seriously. I don't think I can handle any more levels of weirdness right now. I think that I was reborn in the wrong dimension or something."

William waved him off with a chuckle while Digital-Dragon-Master shook her head in disbelief and walked off, dragging Kaio and Arbomon with her. Shortly thereafter, Izzy bade the two boys good-bye and mingled with the crowd, and TK and Kari, alongside, Jeri, Kenta, and Kazu (giving them strange looks as they passed) followed after them. As William watched them go a familiar face approached. It was Reno. He gave the two a weird look.

"What was that all about?" He asked.

"Never mind," said Ryan quickly. Reno looked over at William, but before he could say anything, the sound of music being played began, and the lyrics soon followed.

_Friends all tried to warn me _

_But I held my head up high_

_All the time they warned me_

_But I only passed them by_

_They all tried to tell me_

_But I guess I didn't care_

_I turned my back and _

_Left them standing there_

"What the heck is this?" Asked Ryan as he cocked an eyebrow at Reno.

"Oh, the author's are doing a songfic job, mostly out of remembrance for the fall of a once great author, but also because the adventure's over and we can all try to get on with our lives again, so it's to add a touch of drama to everything that's happened. Just run with it."

"Well, just so long as they don't do any of those, _The end… Or is it?_ Kind of stuff." Grumbled Ryan as he folded his arms across his chest. "I really hate that."

"Shhh!" Went William. "I wanna hear the rest of this!"

_All the burning bridges that have fallen after me_

_All the lonely feelings and the burning memories_

_Everyone I left behind each time I closed the door_

_Burning bridges lost forevermore _

_Joey tried to help me find a job a_

_A while ago_

_When I finally got it I didn't want to go_

_The party Mary gave for me_

_When I just walked away_

_Now there's nothing left for me to say_

_All the burning bridges that have fallen after me_

_All the lonely feelings and the burning memories_

_Everyone I left behind each time I closed the door_

_Burning bridges lost forevermore_

_Years have passed and I keep thinking_

_What a fool I've been_

_I look back into the past and_

_Think of way back then_

_I know that I lost everything I thought that I could win_

_I guess I should have listened to my friends_

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Izzy found Mimi standing near the edge of the crowd, not too far from Davis watching the sun as it rose above the horizon. He walked up to her and stopped at her side. Neither of them said a single word, too caught up in how they were feeling to even say anything. Even though the false memories that they had of the time that they shared together were already fading, they had left their mark on the two young adults, and they were going to have to come to terms with that, with the emotions that even now burned within their hearts.

"Izzy?" Asked Mimi tentatively in an attempt to break the silence. "What happens now? Do we just… go back to the way things were?" Oh, she wished that she didn't feel like she was about to cry right now. She knew that no matter what she wouldn't be able to stop the tears once they started flowing. Izzy's hand reached out and intertwined with her own, earning him a small gasp from the pink loving, fashion girl next to him. Turning to him, she found a light smile on his face, framed perfectly in the orange light of the sun. She could almost feel her worries melting away in its radiance.

"Yesterday you said that you wanted my opinion on something," said the computer genius softly. "I still need to know what it is."

Mimi felt one tear make its way down her cheek, and she buried her face into the boys chest as he carefully wrapped his arms around the girl.

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Davis watched Mimi and Izzy for a bit before turning away to look at the couple ahead of him. Like him, they too were trying to find solace from the events that had occurred. He felt a tear roll down his cheek as he watched them embrace, but he felt no hatred, no jealousy directed towards them. Only… tranquility. Next to him, Veemon nudged him.

"You okay?"

"Yeah," said Davis throatily. "Yeah, I'll be fine. Don't worry about me."

"So… back to usual, huh buddy?"

Davis smiled; remembering the last time Veemon had said that. "Yeah, looks like."

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_All the burning bridges that have fallen after me_

_All the lonely feelings and the burning memories_

_Everyone I left behind each time I closed the door_

_Burning bridges lost forevermore_

_Burning bridges lost forevermore_

The music faded on that last note, continuing on a bit for a few seconds before finally tapering off as the sun rose in the sky, illuminating the land with its soft glow. An age had ended, but a new one was beginning, and for everyone who stood beneath the sun, they were all going to be a part of it, for good or ill. And as the sun continued its journey through the blue sky, the assembled authors decided that it was proper to add a little something of their own to its beauty. As though out of some old movie, words formed in the sky, revealing themselves slowly as they appeared in the burning light of Earth's closest star.

**THE END!**

**…**

**…**

**…For now…**

"Goddamn it!" Exclaimed a brown haired boy from where he stood at the Tower's base.

"Sorry Ryan," said William, with a small, sympathetic smirk on his face.

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A/N: The song "Burning Bridges" was the sound track that went with an old 1970's World War Two movie called "Kelly's Heroes", and it was both the first and last song that they played in the movie. I found it on YouTube (thank God for YouTube!) after looking for a song that I felt was appropriate for ending this fic (it's not fully finished by the way. I still have one last chapter that I'd like to share with you all. You may want to read it too, as it will have some surprises in store for you). There was a scene from the end of that movie where the main characters are riding off into the sunset with that song playing in the back ground, and I was moved by it, and wanted to capture something similar for this chapter as well as give a tribute to the Lord of Fantasy even though he was evil. I felt that it best described his overall reaction towards events in this story as well as his own life. Anyway, like I said, I still have one more chapter to go, so stay tuned! Until then, this is Crazyeight, signing off!

8


	36. Chapter 36

Disclaimer: Hah! For once this disclaimer isn't really necessary! (sighs) Well, actually it is, I just hoped that after 35 chapters… well, anyway. I still don't own Digimon, and I doubt anyone on this site will. A pity. I think.

The Wages of Fans is Fiction: Chapter 36

Some Final Thoughts…

Well, I have to say that writing this story has been pretty fun, and it's also been something of a learning experience for me. For a fic that started out with no real plans about what I was going to write about (not something that I'd ever suggest doing) and was almost entirely written on the fly (again, not something that I'd suggest doing), I think that I did pretty well and survived the experience unscathed, though a little bit shaken. I am going to miss this fic as well as all the characters that have been present in it, not just my own, but also Kaio, Reno, and John. It was fun writing character's that weren't my own and weren't canon. It kind of gave the story a more lively feeling, as though it wasn't just me who was writing it, but also that others were helping.

So, to that end I would like to start extending thanks to everyone who has read, reviewed, and lent me characters. Ahem! (starts playing 'Dedicated' by Linkin Park for background music)

A very happy thanks goes to those who have reviewed and enspired me to write and continue this fic all the way to its end!

**Tshk**

**Koichi's Girl**

**Sushimonster724**

**CrestOfHealing**

**FluffyShrekGirl**

**Gigawolf1**

**Dag 417**

**Digital-Dragon-Master**

And a special hurrah goes out to:

**Gigawolf1**: Thanks for providing me the character's John and Tapirmon, and for giving me permission to allow him to be Renamon's boyfriend for reasons of character development. In the words of William Shatner from _Generations_, "It was… _fun._"

**Dag 417**: My first and most constant reviewer, from whose stories "It's Real: The First Adventure" and "An Alternate Tale" spins the character's Reno and Dagmon. Thank you for your constant support, reading, reviewing, and for the characters Reno and Dagmon. I had a blast writing them. Thanks again.

**Digital-Dragon-Master**: Thanks for taking the time to read and review my fic, as well as for not only lending me the characters Kaio and Arbomon, but also yourself for the final showdown with the Lord of Fantasy. And thanks for putting up with my writing for so long and pointing out all the things that I did right and wrong, as it helped me out considerably when I prepared to write my next chapter. That was awesome!

There are still some things that I felt that I could have done better at. I would have liked to have done more to focus on the Digi-destined characters and have the Frontier kids play a much bigger role than I had initially written, and I feel that I focused a little too much on Ryan's feelings and emotions from when he had died. Sure, he is one of my characters, and I felt the need to add a little emotional edge to the story (besides what was done to the canon characters), but I think that I overdid it. If anyone has felt this way as well, I do apologize.

…

Well, I don't know about you guys, but I'm kind of in the mood for a sequel. I feel a little nervous about it because, in my mind, sequels don't come off as good as the original. Meh, let me know what you guys think. I have the story half-planned, but I'm not going to get to it right away. I still have my main stories to work on, plus another up and coming project (not to mention school work, grrrr…), and I need to do some research. My biggest weakness in "Wages" was that I had seen very little of Frontier; just the first seven episodes, plus some scatterings of random ones, and the final episode, but that was it. Not really enough to help me with characterization, which was why they played so small a role in this fic (for which I am dreadfully sorry. All you Frontier fans may burn me at the stake now). Next time, I'll do better. Hopefully. I intend to take a more serious approach to the sequel than I did with this one (I mean writing and characterization. It'll still count as something of a parody), and close up any loopholes that may be in this fic. I would also like to be able to keep the same cast (Ryan, Chris, Will, Reno, John, and Kaio) with maybe some new OC's as well, and maybe… Avatars? Let me know what you think.

Anyway, I promised you all a surprise, and here it is! The following are some spoilers for my sequel, titled **"The Four Seasons"**.

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_The diamond shards hovered in the air briefly before they began their descent towards Richoemon. Ryan's mind was awhirl with a number of conflicting emotions, but as soon as Renamon pronounced her attack one became all encompassing, and at that moment he saw red._

_**"YOU CAN'T DO THIS!"** Ryan shouted, his voice trapped in the grip of a near murderous rage. **"I WON'T LET YOU TAKE HIM FROM ME!"**_

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_Dracaramon ran for all he was worth, but in the end it didn't matter. Something snapped closed around his neck and forced him to stumble as an overwhelming force overrode all sense of self control and self consciousness that he had, flinging his partner off his back with a cry. With a groan, Chris rolled onto his back and took a look at his friend as he rose to his feet. His eyes were glowing a fierce crimson._

_'That's not good…'_

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_"You're trapped with no way out. You can't even risk digivolving here. What're you going to do?"_

_"The same thing that every would-be hero does when the odds are against them: improvise. Why? Was that a trick question?"_

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_"So this is it, huh?" He asked, looking up at the starry night. "This is how it all ends? Strangers in our own home and all we can do is fade away…"_

_The boy's companion didn't answer him._

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And there you have it folks! That's it for my spoilers! Good? Bad? Somewhere in between? Let me know. Until then, you are now exiting the world that is… Crazyeight! Later and thanks again!

3


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